Old man winter keeps most birds out of sight

I went through my past February columns and found I had a dearth of things to write about, just as I have this year. One of my thoughts is to turn this into a "gossip" or "people" column instead of writing about nature. I wrote about some people last month and got a good response. I mentioned the Fitzpatrick family; one member is head of Cornell's lab of ornithology. I heard from a longtime birder in prestigious West Powderhorn who has been friends of the family for 40 years. The Powderhorn birder also reported seeing a female Hairy Woodpecker. I usually see a Hairy Woodpecker in January but did not see one last month.

I mentioned seeing neighbors at "Winged Migration" at the Riverview theater and as soon as the paper came out, they quit showing the movie. But now it is back on weekends; a very well-made movie, worth seeing on a cold Minnesota night.
The last segment of my new foray into people instead of birds (actually it is about both): The Star Tribune Outdoors page on New Year's Eve was about Eagle watching at Colvill Park on the south edge of Red Wing and at the National Eagle Center in Wabasha. The woman quoted from Red Wing, Kelly Larson, is a former Powderhorn resident and now owns and operates the Feathered Friend Wild Bird Store in Red Wing. An Eagle watching road trip along the Mississippi would be a good diversion anytime the weather is reasonable this winter. You don't necessarily have to go far. One was near the Stone Arch Bridge last month and Eagles are practically guaranteed at the locks at Hastings and at Colvill Park, Reads Landing, Wabasha and many points in between. Colvill Park and Wabasha have knowledgeable volunteers with spotting scopes on duty on weekends.

The park bird and yard bird reports won't take up much space this month. All I have seen in the park are a few Crows and some English Sparrows. Park walkers sometimes ask me what I am seeing and I report, "Not much, but I am getting exercise." The wind chill is minus 35 degrees as I write this and I am not getting any exercise, though I got quite a bit shoveling snow. I am attempting to follow up on a Saw-Whet Owl report. I have never seen one in the park, but two were here a number of years ago.

The yard has been OK with the usual Chickadees, House Finches, Rock Doves, English Sparrows, European Starlings, Juncos, Cardinals, and finally, my first Nuthatch of the winter. Usually I have heard the male Cardinal mating song by the end of January. This year, I haven't, but someone reported hearing the optimistic "what cheer" call.

Freeway birding has been sparse. I have spotted only two Red-tailed Hawks on metro freeways in January but I did see a mature Bald Eagle and an unidentified hawk on I-35 while driving to Duluth. I also saw a small flock of Canada Geese over I-94 in North Minneapolis near the river.

In an effort to fill up more space and to put forth some interesting information, I thought I would share some findings from a recent paper on urban Cooper's Hawks’ winter foraging behavior. The Cooper's Hawk is the most common hawk in our neighborhood and many years, one or more is present in early winter. The study was done in Terre Haute, Ind., by Tim Roth III and Steven Lima of Indiana State University. Using sophisticated electronic tracking and observation, they determined that three species made up 95 percent of the hawks' prey: 52 percent European Starlings, 24 percent Mourning Doves and 19 percent Rock Doves (pigeons). This is, more or less, good news for bird watchers and most birds, as many people consider Starlings and Pigeons as nuisance birds, and some members of the Minnesota Legislature think Mourning Doves should be used as target practice before hunters move on to larger birds. The Cooper's Hawks succeeded in about 20 percent of their attacks. The researchers think the hawks spend their time on medium-sized birds, rather than sparrows to get the most food out of their 20 percent success rate. Thank you to Andy Jones and Minnesota Birding for the Cooper's Hawk information.

News Flash! or Breaking News! as they say way too often on commercial TV: The wind chill is now minus 39 degrees Fahrenheit. I hope all birds and mammals (including humans) survive this stretch of weather.

Comments and observations are always welcome. Send them to me, in care of the Southside Pride. Thank you.