Science Forward

Besides our terrible bus driver almost killing us passengers and a couple of pedestrians, I would say that overall, Bioblitz was a worthwhile experience with several expectations met and even some surprises.

I decided to join the birds group and for some odd reason I was expecting something like this…

The Pigeons of Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy. (Source: http://geggis.com/Italy/pics/Italy07_330.jpg)

… when really it was not like that at all. It was more of listening to certain bird calls and observing flying patterns and other actions to determine the type of bird. As compared to the other taxon groups, this group had less of a hands-on approach and solely required careful observation and background information in order to identify the bird.

Best taxon group ever.

Our group was lead by Todd Olson, who was an extremely avid and knowledgeable “birder.” We began our search on the most wild-life-resembling and less-intensively-cared-for trail. What I found interesting was the fact that most groups decided to do go along the same path. This trail (unchanged by human hands) was the one that served to be more successful for prior groups. I feel that this really shows urban ecology on a smaller scale. As beautiful as the well-tended rose garden was in NYBG, not even one bird would be in sight in that area. Over time urban centers will just start expanding even more and in turn manipulating the land around them. So these animals are placed in dispersed pockets which don’t necessarily have the best effects. One example that our taxon leader brought up was the passenger pigeons which have been extinct for a century now. Before going extinct, passenger pigeons were the most common birds in North America. In their abundance, people would hunt them which in turn depleted their flocks. There was also a loss of habitat with deforestation. But how could such a highly abundant species go extinct just like that? Our leader explained that maybe they were so dispersed into much smaller flocks that they weren’t able to breed and survive properly. It makes you think that this kind of situation can very easily occur again now.

Extinct passenger pigeon. (source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Martha_last_passenger_pigeon_1914.jpg)

As I noted earlier, we had less of a hands-on approach so we mostly would stake out in certain areas that seemed to be most promising. For the first 20 minutes we didn’t see any birds at all, but we definitely heard them. Todd began identifying them right off the bat: a blue jay, a blue jay imitating a red tailed hawk, a red bellied woodpecker, a yellow bellied woodpecker, a tufted titmouse and a gray catbird. There was even a chipmunk imitating bird calls.

Chipmunk hanging out on a branch.

In this first segment of having no birds in sight, Todd began to enlist certain techniques to help attract birds. One was to make this a low whisper: “pshpshpshpshpsssh.” The whispering sound usually sparks the curiosity of birds. The other method was to play tracks of bird calls to attract a specific bird. Our leader told us about the couple of problems with this method. One problem is that some the birds have gotten so used the the recordings and could identify it, so that they don’t even respond as much anymore. Another problem with the tracks is that it could potentially disturb the social interactions both between birds of different species and between birds of the same species. For example, some bird calls are mainly for competition and breeding, so claiming territory and finding mates could limit the bird when hearing the tracks.

birdtrack

As you could see, these methods weren’t very fruitful in the beginning, but we soon began to be more successful.

Our first successful area was one surrounded by these brightly-colored, trumpet-shaped flowers.

These were the types of flowers that attracted many types of birds, but it’s most known to attract hummingbirds. We unfortunately saw no humming birds in this area, mainly because of the time of day (3:00 pm). If it had been the early morning, we most likely would have seen more. But we finally were able to see glimpses of the birds we heard earlier on. We were able to see a blue jay and a few American robins. As we trekked on forward, we approached the edge of the forest, which was filled with bird activity.

We were able to see more American robins, a couple of hummingbirds, and even a few red tailed hawks flying so high in the sky, that they were barely visible by the naked eye.

A red-tailed hawk (taken by Emily)

One last place that we saw several birds was at a mini-waterfall. Morning doves, song sparrows and American robins were seen bathing and sitting in the trees nearby.

A robin bathing. (middle right where the ricks meet the greenery)

All-in-all, I’m more than satisfied with choosing to join the birds group and I had a great time, unlike the girl in the taxon group next to us who entered the woods and ran into a wasp’s nest and got stung 8 times in a row (ouch). I’m thankful for this experience and being opened up to the vastness of nature, and even being able to see it within an urban area.