A perfectly nice winter's morning

It's as pleasant a January day in Boston as can be expected. A few degrees below freezing, no wind, lots of sunshine. Of course, last weeks few days that were around 60 were nice, but not typical--plus they were muddy.

Lots of birds again this morning--a nice big flicker posed for a moment, but not long enough to get a good picture. We keep hearing, but not seeing, an Eastern Phoebe. The bufflehead pair is still hanging around, and the usual mallards, black ducks, and Canada geese are about. I took the dogs to a tree that had a bunch of squirrels rough housing in it, and all of a sudden a red-tailed hawk burst off of a low branch (I don't know how I missed it) and flew across the river.

I took the dogs over to a big frozen puddle and let Charlie scratch at it until he broke one of his nails. He still hasn't noticed--usually he acts like its the end of the world. It's an ugly, splintered break, which is going to require clipping, which is so painful for both of us. Now he's happily finishing up his third frozen chicken leg.

When we got home to the front door, I heard the whoosh of wings, and looked up to see a bird bigger and faster than a pigeon, blasting away from our birdfeeder. Looks like the Cooper's hawk we saw yesterday was hunting for an easy meal.

I think I got some nice pictures of some icicles under one of the nearby stone bridges. Stay tuned. Still trying to figure out if I'm going to go to the Common to take some 365 urban species pictures. I'm leaning toward staying nearby today, since it's already late and I have some local errands.

Morning pictures

Who's that hiding in the Phragmites reeds?


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365 Urban Species. #017: Bufflehead

Urban species #017: Bufflehead Bucephalus albeola


Researching the bufflehead has illustrated a small portion of the web of life to me. Often you'll hear us natural history types use that phrase, and you probably think of the food chain, or that song from "The Lion King" (or South Park). What the phrase really encapsulates is the idea that all living things are dependent on one another, and this over-simplified example helps explain the idea:

Buffleheads require holes in trees to nest, and reproduce. No holes in trees, no new buffleheads, in 10 or 15 years, no buffleheads at all. First of all, that requires that there be trees, and secondly, holes in them. As it turns out, most buffleheads nest in holes made by northern flickers (a flicker is a kind of woodpecker, surely to be featured in 365US soon). Northern flickers are highly dependent on carpenter ants for food. They eat lots of other bugs, and in the winter they eat fruit, but if carpenter ants (Genus Camponotus) ceased to exist, northern flickers would soon follow. Carpenter ants depend, obviously, on trees. They don't eat wood, but they make their nests in it; but they don't need just any wood, they need wood that is dead and being decomposed by a fungus. The fungus, of course, needs the tree to survive. No tree = no fungus = no ants = no flickers = no buffleheads. Web of life.

Of course, all of these organisms can be found in urban areas. Buffleheads can make use of properly constructed birdhouses, flickers can make nests in telephone poles, and carpenter ants are happy to make nests in the wood of your house. Wood-decomposing fungus, it is safe to say, lives anywhere there is wood.

Buffleheads.

Buffleheads are North America's smallest ducks. They are found throughout Canada in summer, and migrate south to parts of North America with unfrozen water. They feed on invertebrates by diving and swimming, after which they pop up to the surface in an amusing manner. Of course, the bodies of water around cities are less likely to freeze, attracting migrant buffleheads.

Our little stretch of the Muddy River has hosted many species of migratory water bird in the five years I've lived here, and for the first time we have a pair of buffleheads. Photo by cottonmanifesto