Birding around UVM's Campus

We started off the day looking for Pine Grosbeaks, however, after about 30 minutes of looking we couldn’t find any birds. We went out towards the end of the day, around sundown, which is when a lot of birds are usually out, however, it was super cold that day so we didn’t see a lot of activity. We were also in an urban habitat which a lot of songbirds don’t like because of the noise and activity and around campus there are a lot of trees which common song birds don't usually gather in. So, we kept walking around to see if we could find some birds and finally we saw two American Crows heading overhead.
Crows are easily distinguishable because of their dark nature. Their bodies are black so they look like a silhouette against the sky and the wing-flaps look like a bird of prey's wing-flaps meaning that they are slow and graceful. However, unlike a bird of prey, they need to keep flapping in order to stay up where as a bird of prey can start flapping and linger in the wind stream. Crows are also a lot bigger than songbirds so it’s easy to distinguish them flying in the air, where as it is harder to distinguish them from a bird of prey. You will also see them flying a lot, we usually see them flying over instead of on the ground, so their pointed, elongated wings are usually the most recognizable trait.
We also saw a lot of Cedar Waxwings which we were not expecting to find. They were in the location where we heard the Pine Grosbeaks were located, so even though we were disappointed to not find the Pine Grosbeaks we were, however, excited to find a large flock of the Cedar Waxwings since we saw no bird activity about an hour prior. Cedar Waxwing‘s are distinguishable from other songbirds because of the tuft on top of their head and their slender-like nature. In a tree you can confuse them with a tufted titmouse (because of the tuft and not shape) or another slender bird like a grosbeak or a starling. However, once you look at the size the body shape, the head shape, the tuft, and the location, you can distinguish what type of species they are. The way they fly is also pretty recognizable because it’s fast and sharp and their wings are small but they like flying tree to tree so even though you can’t distinguish the wing flap on them you can still see their bodies moving quickly from tree to tree and pick out their body shape while moving. The habitat we saw the waxwings in was also their habitat niche. They love trees with berries in them so you can always find them in trees with berries or food because they use of a lot of energy flying so they have to keep eating and so the berry trees on the waterman green was a good location for them.
Lastly, we saw some Feral Pigeons which were located on top of the Davis Center. This is a spot where we could picture these pigeons to be because pigeons like urban environments and they also like to soak up the sun on top of buildings in these cities so UVM is a good location for them. We were surprised not to see them on the sidewalks, however, when we saw them on top of the roof we knew that they had to be a pigeon or a bird of prey. You can easily distinguish a pigeon from a bird of prey because of the pigeon's small head and large body and their head is also rounded with largely different coloration than a bird of prey. They also have a very clumsy like type of flying that always look like they’re about to fall but somehow they end up flying and making it to their location. While they are flying they have a distinctive wing flap and make a flying noise like a Mourning Dove. I usually say they’re like a small turkey where you can’t think they fly but then they go and show you up.
We were only able to find three different species of birds while we we birding because of the time we went out and the location we went birding in. Next time, we are going to try a more secluded/wooded area to go birding in.

Posted on February 21, 2019 04:20 AM by elizabethkaufmann