Assorted Beach Sightings

Between migrating birds and increasingly active residents, the beach certainly is an interesting place to watch spring take hold! Here are a few sightings from my visit to Silver Sands State Park yesterday morning.
 
Several male Red-winged Blackbird were busy staking claims in the marsh, and I guess the boardwalk is part of this fancy fellow's territory:
 

Sing it, Mr. Blackbird!
 

A Greater Yellowlegs graciously posed for a few pictures:

Those legs are quite striking!

I was pretty tickled to find that the stretch of boardwalk that was rebuilt last summer is now a roosting and courting (and possibly nesting) spot for Rock Pigeons. It was a little strange to hear cooing sounds coming from beneath my feet!
 

And there's a rabbit again! I'm surprised at how bold these creatures have gotten at this park; this rabbit was even near a path where people and dogs frequently walk:
 

All in all, a lovely beach day.

Exploring Wales, Part 1: Conwy Jackdaws and Other Birds

Last week, Paul and I ventured across the Atlantic Ocean and visited an exotic land: Wales! We stayed in Conwy -- a medieval walled city (castle included) on the northern coast -- and spent three glorious days exploring centuries- (and even millenia-) old man-made structures and amazingly dramatic countryside. We saw tons of things in our relatively short visit and had an awesome time!

There were old buildings and landscapes, of course, but we saw plenty of wildlife as well, mostly birds. It was really cool to hang out with these foreign (for me) creatures, and I even reached a new level of familiarity with a few recurring birds by the end of the trip. One of these was a bird that we saw everywhere we went in Wales, but which made a particularly strong presence at our home base in Conwy: the Eurasian Jackdaw.
 

These handsome birds (members of the crow family) were all over in Conwy, and especially in the main part of the town, where they were busy building nests in the tall, 13th-century walls:
 

I think these birds are extremely cool-looking, with those stark silvery outfits and brilliant eyes. And they certainly looked right at home among the craggy ruins of walls jutting up above more modern rooftops, watching over the town like sleek uniformed sentinels:
 

All throughout Conwy's town and castle, we saw Jackdaws peering out of holes in the old stone walls:
 

Basically, the Jackdaws seem to have some degree of ownership over parts of Conwy. And even more interesting to me, Conwy itself seems to have made the bird-town connection official. Surely that's a Jackdaw on top of this signpost in the center of town, yes?
 

The term "jackdaw" is also apparently used to refer to people born within Conwy's town walls. Overall, I feel like Paul and I got a special view of this town because we were paying attention to these birds.

The Jackdaws weren't the only birds vying for space among Conwy's walls and rooftops, but these other avian occupants were already pretty familiar (even if their home wasn't). Conwy's Rock Pigeons demonstrated why "pigeon hole" is a phrase:
 

And just as big and loud as they are here in North America, Herring Gulls staked claims on the walls as well:
 

Away from the Conwy town center and on our countryside travels, several other utterly delightful birds popped up. This Blue Tit was one of my favorites, and I was very happy whenever one of these fancy relatives of our chickadees and titmice appeared:
 

This Eurasian Wren was also adorable, perched here on an old stone wall near the small town of Dolwyddelan:
 

Wood Pigeons were quite common, and I thought of them as Mega-pigeons because they're so much bigger and bulkier than the Rock Pigeons that I'm more used to seeing:
 

Finally, we saw quite a few European Robins, and after three days, I came to love these gregarious little puffballs who popped up frequently to sing and show off -- often at eye level -- with very little fear of us. Their bright orange bibs certainly stood out among the predominantly brown (early spring) landscape:
 

These birds looked even more handsome, though, when they posed among new spring-green buds:
 

One robin landed directly in front of Paul and I as we rested on a park bench, and it proceeded to serenade us (LOUDLY) for several minutes:

Sing it, little bird!

But hey, watch where you're pointing that beak!
 

In all, I loved getting a feel for Wales through some of its common avian wildlife. We met a few other creatures, as well, who -- while not technically wild -- seemed especially Welsh.... But that's another post entirely! Stay tuned!

Pigeon Rescue

I woke up this morning to my ringing cell phone. It was Paul (yes, I sleep in while he's industrious and goes out running), and he was calling me with a problem: He'd found a Rock Pigeon on the side of the road, alive and moving around, but clearly injured in some way and unable to fly.

I didn't have a clear idea about what to do. Part of that was because I was still 95% asleep, but I also just don't know very much about injured wildlife. I knew that there are several wildlife rehabilitators near us, but my first guess was that such places might not even take in a Rock Pigeon, since they're not a native species, and they're so common. (That turned out to be a wrong guess, but I didn't know that at the time.) So I advised Paul to leave it and come home, as sad as he might be to have to do that -- he didn't have anything to carry it in anyway, and a lady in the neighboring house was staring at him like she thought he might start stealing things.

Once I actually woke up, though, I did a little research. As it turns out, rehabilitators are actually more likely to accept non-native species like Rock Pigeons, House Sparrows, and European Starlings, since those species aren't protected under certain federal wildlife laws and a person doesn't need a special permit to care for them. (I don't know the exact legal details for the situation, but it boils down to something like that.) So Paul and I decided to act. On the off-chance that the pigeon was still there, we grabbed a cardboard box, put a comfy towel inside, and walked back to the spot where Paul had seen the bird an hour before.

And there it was, sitting in the greenery right next to the road. When we approached the bird, it flapped its wings but wasn't able to fly away. So I just reached down and scooped it up in my hands, and as soon as I was holding it, my earlier "just leave it be" attitude pretty much evaporated. It was warm, and so soft, and I know Rock Pigeons are about as common as can be, and they don't even technically "belong" on this continent, but this was a gorgeous bird, a real living creature, and I kind of melted a little inside at that moment.

Look at those eyes! And that iridescent ruff! I can see why people keep these birds as pets. (Photo taken by Paul.)

We didn't see anything immediately wrong with the little fellow -- no blood, no obviously broken wing -- so we put him (I don't really know the bird's sex, but we guessed male) into the box, where he nestled down into the towel to rest. I called around, and a nice lady at the Ansonia Nature Center's wildlife rehabilitation place agreed to take him in. (She first had me check the bird's legs for a band, to make sure it wasn't someone's pet, which is also when we took the above picture.)

So we drove our pigeon friend over there during Paul's lunch break and handed him off. We'll call back in a couple of days to see how things went, but for now we're just happy to have done our part to help someone in need. Be well, little Rock Pigeon!

P.S. Don't worry, I washed my hands, although I'm pretty sure it's a myth that pigeons are particularly "dirty" birds -- no dirtier than any other bird, I would imagine. But still, it's best to be safe.