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One of Our Largest Woodpeckers

Posted by Gary on October 18, 2017 in Birds, Birds of the Field and Forest

And my favorite woodpecker is the large pileated woodpecker, a bird of mature forests. This crow sized bird is mostly black with a bright red crest.

When I lived on Long Island New York, it was extremely rare there. Yet it is a common species just across the Long Island Sound in New England and south to Florida.

Its favorite food is carpenter ants, but will also eat wood-boring beetle larvae, termites and other insects found in the tree canopy.

This bird’s population has been on the increase since the 1960’s with the decline of farmland and the increase in forests.

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The Black-crowned Night Heron

Posted by Gary on October 16, 2017 in Birds, Wading Birds
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Although you will often see this heron during the day roosting in trees, this small stocky bird becomes active at dusk and hunts at night. It has found its niche of hunting at a time when most egrets and herons have settled down for the night thereby reducing competition for food.

Except for Australia and Antarctica, the black-crowned night heron lives in wetlands around the world. It eats a variety of food including small fish, insects, worms, shrimp, leeches, tadpoles and small lizards.

Even though there are not as many of these herons as there use to be, it is still a common species and fairly secure in its range.

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The American Flamingo

Posted by Gary on October 15, 2017 in Birds, Wading Birds

Go to any Florida zoo or amusement park with animals and you will undoubtedly see an exhibit with elegant flamingoes.

Flamingoes are not native to Florida although you may see a few in the Everglades that have wandered over from the Caribbean where most live.

Flamingoes prefer shallow lakes and lagoons where they wade on long stilt-like legs to find food. A flamingo stirs the mud up with its feet, then plunges its head into the water and uses upper bill as a shovel scooping small fish, tiny shrimp and to strain algae to eat.

Illegal poaching and habitat loss are two threats to this species, but there are many conservation groups that monitor flamingo populations and that work with governments to develop plans to protect this species.

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The Roseate Spoonbill

Posted by Gary on October 14, 2017 in Birds, Wading Birds

Beautiful from a distance, but odd looking up close with its long flat bill, the roseate spoonbill is a bird that was nearly extirpated for its feathers for the millinery industry in the late 1800’s. This species re-colonized the Gulf coast shoreline marshes from Florida to Texas in the early 1900’s and the population rebounded.

This bird is aptly named for the shape of its bill. Spoonbills wade in shallow muddy waters of salt and fresh water marshes moving their bill from side to side to filter tiny bits of food from the water.

Roseate spoonbills also live in many areas of South America. Novice birders often mistaken this bird for a flamingo, but there really is no comparison.

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The Carolina Chickadee

Posted by Gary on October 9, 2017 in Birds, Birds of the Field and Forest

When I moved from New York to Florida, I was a bit homesick. I found comfort in the chickadees that came to my backyard feeder. Up north the black-capped chickadee frequented our sunflower feeders. Here in Florida the Carolina chickadee, a bird that is almost identical, comes to our backyard feeders to eat sunflower seeds too.

These two species have black bibs on gray chests with black caps. Black-capped chickadees are slightly larger and have a bit more white on their napes, something you would never be able to distinguish from any distance.

Carolina chickadees live from southern Pennsylvania and New Jersey south to Florida and the black-capped lives from Pennsylvania and New Jersey north. Where the ranges overlap, the two species interbreed.

There is a slight difference in the way they sing chicka-dee-dee-dee and it is something I can recognize – to me it’s a chickadee with a southern accent.

Although the Carolina Chickadee population has declined a little, this bird is still common and widespread in the southern U.S.

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