Photo by Chris Bosak
An American crow in Danbury, CT, winter 2019.
Crows are exceedingly smart, timberdoodles are back and cardinals just may be nesting already. Those are some of the interesting email topics I have received recently.
Don from Laconia wrote to say he has observed some interesting behavior from crows that hang around his yard. When the crows find a piece of food that is too big or hard, they carry the food to a nearby puddle and dip the food into the water to soften it and make it more manageable.
It has long been known that crows and other corvids, such as ravens and blue jays, have a high degree of intelligence. There is a video on YouTube with close to 10 million views that shows an experiment with a crow figuring out how to access food from tubes using water displacement. The pieces of food are floating on water in a tube just out of reach of the crow’s beak. In a series of tests, the crow has to figure out how to raise the level of water enough to reach the food. The crow eventually aces all of the tests and gets to the food each time.
Photo by Chris Bosak — Tufted titmouse in New England, January 2024.
The tufted titmouse is one of the most reliable birds to find in New England, regardless of season. The slowest of bird walks are often graced by a tufted titmouse or two.
Even if the bird is not seen, it can usually be heard. Titmice have a big voice that belies their small stature. They are not as surprisingly boisterous as Carolina wrens, but gram-per-gram, titmice are still one of the most vociferous birds.
The bird’s common “peter peter peter” song is one of the first bird songs I learned as a beginning birder way back when. I heard the loud, clear whistles and refused to continue my walk until I found the source. The bird sang over and over as I scanned the area until, finally, I found the titmouse in a nearby tall evergreen. I remember being surprised at how dainty the bird appeared compared to the bravado of the song.
Cardinals also have songs with loud, clear whistles and the titmouse’s song is reminiscent of those. The cardinal’s songs, however, are more melodic and complicated than the simple “peter peter peter” of the titmouse. There are also variations in the titmouse’s song as it can be different in tone or number of syllables.
But that is hardly the only sound a titmouse makes. I have been stumped several times hearing a bird in the woods only to eventually find it was a titmouse. One of their calls sounds a lot like a chickadee and often causes confusion. It’s best to try to spot the bird to ensure which one is calling. To add to the confusion, titmice and chickadees are often found in the same area.
Titmice also have an extremely wide variety of harsh scolding calls, some of which are common and familiar and some that sound completely unfamiliar as they are not heard as often.
Which brings me to the next question about the titmouse. If there is more than one titmouse, are you looking at titmice or titmouses? The short answer is both are acceptable, but titmice is by far the more common usage, even if may not be technically correct. The titmouse (bird) and mouse (rodent) are obviously not related – in taxonomy or etymology — so why is it titmice? I guess it just sounds better and that’s what people have always called it. I’m sure there’s a better explanation, but I don’t know the true history of it.
Every birding organization and every well-known bird author I checked use titmice as the plural, and that includes the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, which I use as my go-to source for birding information. Even the dictionaries I checked use titmice. In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to find a source that uses titmouses. Some language purists may bristle at the term titmice, but it’s here to stay.
Regardless of how you choose to pluralize the word, the titmouse is a New England favorite that entertains us at our feeders and in the woods. Hardly a day goes by, regardless of the time of year, when I don’t see a titmouse, whether I’m actively looking for birds or not. That wasn’t always the case in New England as they were once regarded as a southern bird, but they have slowly and steadily expanded their range throughout New England and into Canada.
It is an energetic bird with a big personality and even bigger voice. Titmice, or titmouses if you prefer, are a welcome addition to the New England biosphere.
Photo by Chris Bosak
Scaup may be seen in huge numbers on large bodies of water in New England in the winter.
Late February and early March is somewhat of a transition period for birdwatching in New England.
The highly anticipated spring migration, which won’t hit its peak until late April and early May, starts with a trickle around mid-March, most notably with American woodcocks and eastern phoebes. Some consider the early male red-winged blackbirds the start of spring migration, but many of these blackbirds overwinter in New England so it’s tough to say if they are arriving in February or have been here all along.
On the other hand, a lot of the winter birds we have enjoyed seeing over the last few months have either gone further south, returned north, or, unfortunately for some, perished in the cold New England winter. Many birds that try to stick out a New England winter, either due to getting lost on their migration route or opting to forego migration altogether, underestimate the power and longevity of our winters and don’t make it to spring.
Photo by Chris Bosak
A white-throated sparrow eats a crabapple in New England, January 2024.
When I was just starting out in the hobby of birdwatching and bird photography, I saw a photo of a bird (I don’t recall the species) eating a berry. It became my mission to get a photo of a bird eating berries. But how would I ever get such a shot, I thought to myself at the time.
In the years that followed, I have had plenty of opportunities to get that coveted shot that once seemed so elusive. I’ve been lucky enough to photograph birds such as yellow-rumped warblers, blackburnian warblers, cedar waxwings, robins, catbirds, hermit thrushes, purple finches, house finches and song sparrows eating berries.
Photo by Chris Bosak – A hermit thrush in New England, January 2024.
For the past two weeks, I’ve written about surprise winter bird sightings such as the catbirds, hermit thrushes, yellow-bellied sapsuckers and purple finches I’ve seen on my recent walks.
It could be shaping up to be an interesting Great Backyard Bird Count this year with all these birds that typically migrate out of New England still hanging around. Who knows what other surprises will show up on the checklists of birders throughout the region, and the world for that matter?
The 27th annual Great Backyard Bird Count takes place from Friday, Feb. 16 through Monday, Feb. 19. Birders of all skill levels may participate in the Count. Simply count birds – alone or with a group – for at least 15 minutes and enter the birds able to be identified and the location at the GBBC website www.birdcount.org. While the results must be submitted online, the birding itself can take place anywhere: a park, backyard, conservation area.
Photo by Chris Bosak – black vultures in a tree on the side of a road in New England.
Birders are trained to find things that look out of place. It is a self-training that happens naturally over the course of many years of looking for birds.
A slight movement in the bushes likely means a bird or small mammal. That bump on a fence railing or post is probably a small perching bird taking a rest. If you are canoeing and the expanse of calm water ahead of you is broken by barely distinguishable ripples, a diving duck may soon reappear on the surface.
This gift that birders have, I think, is most often on display while driving. Most people will drive by a hawk perched on a branch along the road and not even notice it. Birders, on the other hand, see the blob in the tree from a mile away. A positive identification of the blob is made as you zoom past at 65 miles an hour. Just the other day, I noticed a bald eagle perched along a river. From the road, however, it was largely hidden by branches, but something just didn’t look quite right.
This gift is most evident when driving or walking along a familiar route. If you’ve walked a trail through the woods a thousand times, you get to know where every rock, root and upturned tree is. Anything that looks out of the ordinary is immediately noted and inspected to see if it’s a bird or animal.
Photo by Chris Bosak
An eastern bluebird perches on a branch in New England, Jan. 2022.
Here are a few more eastern bluebird photos I managed to get in addition to the one I used to support my last column, which may be found here. It appears to be another good year for seeing bluebirds this New England winter as I’ve heard from several readers who have seen these beauties.
Photo by Chris Bosak
An eastern bluebird perches on a branch in New England, Jan. 2022.
I don’t see a lot of press releases now that journalism is no longer my full-time profession, but I did receive a few last week that caught my eye.
One was from Cole’s Wild Bird Products and the other from the Purple Martin Conservation Association. The topics were very different but did have one important commonality: spring.
Cole’s, which makes a red-hot blend that I’ve used and the birds loved, sent some spring bird-feeding tips. Many people stop feeding birds in the spring for a variety of reasons, including bears and not wanting birds to become dependent upon feeders, but I’m a big fan of spring bird feeding. It’s a great way to get close, long looks at birds such as grosbeaks, orioles, buntings and even a few warbler species if you’re lucky.
Birds of New England.com 