tjkeegan's Journal

Date - 3/6/21
Start time - 5:00 pm
End time - 6:30 pm
Location - Centennial Woods Natural Area
Weather (temperature, wind speed/direction, precipitation) - 25 degrees F, clear skies, no wind aside from the occasional slight breeze
Habitat(s) - Old growth pine stands

Upon entering Centennial Woods, I didn't even have time to take my earbuds out and start listening for birds before I saw a huge owl fly right over my head. I wasn't sure what type of owl it was, so I followed the direction it flew hoping I could get a better look. After a couple of minutes, I found the owl again, perched up high on a tree branch looking off into the distance. The owl made sure to turn and look at me periodically while I was observing it, however it seemed mostly unbothered by my presence, and was clearly focused on something else. The owl, I assumed, was looking down towards the ground for potential prey. After a few minutes the owl left some scat, and then with little warning, leapt off the branch and began flying deeper into the woods. I was unsure of the identification for this owl, but I believe that it was either a Barred Owl or a Great Gray Owl. After seeing this owl, I had trouble finding birds throughout the rest of my walk. I heard two House Sparrows while walking and saw four Canada Geese fly southward overhead as I was leaving the woods, but other than this, it was a mostly quiet night. It is interesting to think about the ways in which different species survive the winter, and the species I observed all handle winter in much different ways. For the owl I saw, its large size and downy feathers likely provide sufficient insulation for the owl to survive as long as it gets enough food and rest, meaning that it would mainly budget its time between hunting and resting. When I was observing the owl, it seemed to be hunting, which would make sense for this assumption. I wonder if the prey which owls hunt for during the wintertime is different in warmer seasons, and I assume that if it is, owls would be searching for larger prey during the winter because larger prey could sustain the owls for longer time periods without forcing them to expend energy on another hunt. The owls would likely overnight in snags with large cavities for warmth and protection. House Sparrows are another species I observed on my walk, and these species likely handle the winter much differently from large owl species. Without so much insulation, House Sparrows likely must spend much more time huddled in dense vegetation and small cavities within snags in order to keep warm. Food is likely difficult to find during the wintertime for House Sparrows, meaning they must also dedicate lots of time to foraging. With a species like this, it would be likely that wintertime conditions could kill many individuals, meaning that the species may also spend a considerable amount of time breeding to offset this impact. The Canada Geese are completely different from owls and sparrows in the way they handle winter conditions, migrating to the South when conditions get too cold. Throughout my walk, I made sure to keep an eye out for snag abundance in the different areas through which I walked. I noted eleven snags overall throughout my walk, and six of them were in the general area where I spotted the owl. The snags in this area were also larger, and filled with larger cavities, than the snags I saw elsewhere on my walk. It seems that in the wintertime especially, areas with abundant snags (and abundant cavities within these snags) are the areas where the most biodiversity can be observed. This is because snags are an important habitat for many winter species seeking to avoid the brutal winter conditions.

Date: 3/20/21
Time: 3:30-5:00 pm
Location: Centennial Woods Natural Area
Weather: Sunny, Clear Skies, Slight breeze, 40 degrees F
Habitat: Mixed... Pine stands, open fields with staghorn sumac, hardwood stands

This birding trip was the trip so far where I have heard and seen the most interactions between birds. There was barely a moment of silence, with bird calls and songs coming from all around, namely from Black-capped Chickadees. The first bird I spotted was a Black-capped Chickadee, and I observed from a distance for a while as the bird foraged. I continued my walk, and shortly later stumbled upon four more Black-capped Chickadees, all of which were again foraging. Foraging is a large part of both the circadian and circannual rhythm for these birds, and I wondered if these birds were preparing for their breeding season. I made some pish calls, and one of the Chickadees ended up getting very close up to me (all of them were close, but this one was within a couple feet). The birds surprisingly did not seem to mind my presence, and I was able to observe them at a very close distance for a good amount of time. This spishing seemed to work, and I wondered why the sound was so enticing to these birds. One thought I had was that the noise sounds similar to noises that could be made by smaller insects, giving the birds incentive to look for prey. This would make sense because the Chickadees were actively foraging, so hearing this sound may have prompted them to look closer to where I was standing. I heard what I believed to be a song sparrow song while observing these Chickadees, but it was not returned by another bird, and I wondered if the Song Sparrow was perhaps singing in the hopes of finding a mate. Shortly after walking away from the Chickadees, I came across a group of 5 American Robin, all of which were perched on staghorn sumac trees. The plumage of these Robins allowed them to blend in very well with the trees, and when I spotted the first one, I thought that it was just a fruit cluster on first glance. The birds seemed to be resting, and I observed them for a few minutes before another hiker came along the trail and scared them off. I wondered if the Robins had intentionally been resting in this spot because they were concealed from potential predators. This prompted me to think about the plumage of the Black-capped Chickadees, and I wondered how their plumage could benefit them in similar situations. The first Chickadee I saw on my hike blended in really well with its surroundings, as it was in a snowy area filled with lots of twigs, allowing the white parts of the bird to blend in with the snow and the darker parts to blend in with the twigs and sticks. I wondered again if the area the birds were in was intentional, and if the Chickadees intended to blend themselves in with their surroundings while foraging. I also heard two distinct American Crows throughout my walk. The first Crow I heard was making very aggressive "caw" sounds, and I wondered if it was mobbing a predator to try and scare it off. I have seen Barred Owls recently in Centennial, so I thought that a barred owl could be a potential predator to this crow. I again heard a crow later in my walk that was making much less aggressive calls, so I thought perhaps it may have been searching for a mate or attempting to socialize with other crows. I also spotted a brown creeper on my walk, but it did not make any calls. Finally, as I was leaving the woods, 10 Canada Geese flew over my head, concluding my birding trip.