These water-loving birds seem to peacefully coexist in the same habitat.Notice that right in the middle of the picture, there's a lone Wood duck. He's the only guy of his species that I've seen around when I went to the Ottawa River's shores yesterday (Oct. 7th). Unfortunately, there was too much shade when this picture was taken, so we can't see the Wood & Mallard Ducks' iridescent plumage.
The Canada Geeese definitely seem to be flocking together more these days in preparation for their annual migration down south. I haven't seen any actual V-shape formations in the sky yet, but I'm keeping my eyes open for this phenomenon in the weeks to come. I love watching these geese clumisly walk on the land and hearing their soft honking sounds that are quite pleasant to the ears. It's so sad that people regard them as pests :( . Yes, they crap a lot, but hey! It's natural fertilizer. People are always good at finding excuses for calling animal 'X' or 'Y' a nuisance, and trying to displace the so-called nuisance animals or simply 'controlling their numbers' (i.e. killing). Yes, these animals have adapted to living in urban areas, but did they have the choice? All the pretty waterways out there are now being built upon and altered by human presence. Now, don't get me wrong: I'm not one of those alarmist 'save the planet' weirdos who feels that we should go back to the Ice Age cave-man era, but we should nevertheless be more tolerant of nature and its animals. Anyways, what's prettier and more natural than seeing geese (and ducks) peacefully swimming in an otheriwse unremarkable river? Try to picture the river without its waterfowl (next summer, I'll try to take such pictures to show you what I mean); the river looks dead.This last picture shows a chubby male Mallard Duck peacefully resting on a rock. Notice his bright yellow bill, his orange legs, and of course, his pretty iridescent green head. He looks very comfortable where he is; I wonder what he's thinking/dreaming about (apparently, birds actually do dream!).
Mallard Ducks sometimes interbreed with other very closely related species, like the Black Duck for instance. At the little pond where I go to, I've seen both Mallard Ducks and Black Ducks, and some ducks that seem to be a hybrid of both species. Both species are similar in size and appearance, so how do we know which is which?
Let's start with the Mallard Ducks:
Male Mallards have a very characteristic dark-green iridescent head that is seprated by a white ring from the chestnut-brown chest and the paler brownish-greyish sides. They also have a bright yellow bill. Female Mallards, meanwhile, are mottled-brown in colour all over their body and have an orange bill that has brownish blotches on it. Both males and females have orange legs and a clearly visible white-bordered bluish-purple patch on their wings.Here, one female (far left) and three male Mallards are getting ready to take a plunge in the water as I approach. Notice the white-bordered bluish-purple patch they have on their wings.
The picture above shows a male (left) swimming ahead of a female (right) Mallard. The female has an orange bill and a clearly visible white-bordered blue patch on its wing. It's also more-or-less uniformly mottled-brown in colour all over its body.Now, let's look at some 'hybrid' Black Duck pictures:
Here we have a 'hybrid' female Black Duck (hybrid because of the orange beak) swimming beside a male Black Duck. Black Ducks look like female Mallards except they have a darker body that contrasts more with their lighter-coloured head. Also, the bluish-purple patch on their wings is NOT bordered by white lines and is less visible than the white-bordered bluish-purple patch on the wings of the Mallards. The difference between the male and the female Black Ducks can be seen by looking at their bills. Males have a bright yellowish bill with no blotches, while females have an olive-coloured bill with blotches. The orange bill of the female in the picture shown above seems to indicate that it has Mallard genes. The dude above looks like a male Black Duck (bright yellow blotch-free bill, and no white-bordered bluish-purple patch). Its body plumage is not as dark as a tyical Black Duck, so it probably has some Mallard genes. It's about to dabble its bill in the water to feed on underwater plants. Here we have what looks like a typical female Black Duck, having a dull olive-green bill. The picture is a bit blurry, but you can see that the neck area is lighter than the body area.Rule of thumb: if you come across a flock of Mallard-looking ducks, but none of them have iridescent green heads or white-bordered bluish-purple patches on their wings, think Black Duck.
N.B. The Black Duck pictures were taken today; the Mallard Duck pictures were taken last year in early July.
First, a challenge: can you spot the bird in the picture? Look carefully...
The tree shown in this picture, which blooms every other spring to give little fruits, attracts a wide variety of birds including: house finches, cedar waxwings, cardinals, crows, starlings, black-capped chickadees, American goldfinches (one year) etc. Squirrels and chipmunks also come.Here is a relatively grainy picture of a cedar waxwing that came to visit the same tree in the month of June last year. The cedar waxwings have been coming regularly to our region in the last 5 or 6 years or so, but only very temporarily. I see them for a couple of weeks or a month or so in the springtime, but after that, they're off. They come only for the little fruits in ours trees. They seem to be perfectly in tune with nature as they come just at the right time to get the fruit when they're all nice and red. If you want to attract birds in your backyard, the best way of doing so, in my opinion, is to plant a tree that makes small berry-like fruits. You'll be attracting tons of birds, but you have to be patient and observe carefully, otherwise you won't distinguish the huge variety that will be coming to visit your backyard.
Here's a hint for the challenge above:
I'm not 100% sure what kind of bird this is, but my guess is that it's a house finch. This picture was taken on the 1st of July last year.Yes, we've had an abnormally dry season in the Ottawa-Gatineau region and for a good part of the Eastern North American coast as well. The grass has become totally dry; the only thing that's still green are the dandelion leaves and some of the other bad weeds (that's what the geese have been feasting on recently). So, it was inevitable that at some point, we'd have a big T-storm. And we got it, with ping pong ball-sized hailstones! Although the huge hailstorms looked fascinating and the sky was pitch black at times (the street lamps even lit up at some point), there wasn't too much damage done and not too many human injuries neither from the T-storm, fortunately.
My photos of the hailstones don't look very good, but here's a picture of a fearless seagull that's out immediately after the T-storm.
I also saw a squirrel come out from under a spruce tree as soon as the T-storm was over. It sniffed out the hailstones, apparently fascinated by them as well. One thing that we definitely have in common with animals is an acute sense of curiousity.
Today, we had mainly sunny and dry +31 deg Celsius weather. I saw one lazy squirrel lying on one of our staircase's steps that reluctantly went to hide in the nearby spruce tree as I approached, and I saw quite a few small birds (black capped chickadees and house sparrows) panting with their little beaks open to evacuate the excess heat from their bodies (birds don't sweat like us).
The lazy squirrel reminded me of this lazy groundhog dude I snapped a picture of a few days earlier in a park in Ottawa.
Hello to all bird lovers!
This is the very first post of my new specialized blog focusing primarily on birds (and other forms of wildlife I sometimes come across). I'm interested in studying and understanding these creatures' behaviours and ultimately answering the big questions concerning them: to what extent are they conscious, how smart are they, what are their communication capabilities, how can we 'communicate' with them, etc.
Here's a cool picture of a curious Canadian goose I took on March 30, 2012 (Ottawa):
It's also my 'mascot' picture. A lot of people find these birds to be a nuisance; so sad...
Some interesting facts about this particular bird (and its partner):
- The geese that come to this park are usually tagged; this goose and its partner weren't tagged, however. Their favourite activities: eating grass (they're true lawn mowers!), preening, more preening, going for a little dip, and napping.
- The geese (and the ducks) don't actually sleep in this park; they fly away at dusk and come back early the next day (there are sometimes little hatchlings that are left behind all on their own during the nightime; they're usually little mallard duck chicks though).
- Canada geese are often confounded with the very similar Cackling Goose species (they look almost identical!). You can tell them apart by looking at their beaks and overall size; Canada geese are larger-bodied and have a longer beak, while Cackling Geese have a stubbier beak, a shorter neck, and a smaller body.
- This goose was probably the male of the couple because it acted in a more dominant, protective manner than its partner which was a little more shy.