Spring Birding

After a day of high winds and snow showers, the bright sunshine today  made one want to get out for a birding trip. It would most likely be the last one by snow machine since we are just starting  our break up period, and flowing water would stop land travel off our home island.

Even with the bright sun, it was a chilly day with a brisk wind out of the southwest and the temperature never got above +34F  while I was traveling about.  I  headed up river  from our home and checked out some of the islands that have a sand dune system. The winter wind move sand from the dunes and the snow in this area melts out sooner and creates feeding area for the returning geese sooner than the less sandy areas.   In one area next to a small frozen lake there were 50 greater white-fronted geese (Anser albifrons) feeding.  Most had already separated into pairs as they spread out over the tundra feeding in the wet areas.  

About 4 miles up river I started seeing well defined shore leads as the advancing first water of break up moved our way. 

View looking up river with the green bands of the shore leads on each side of the deep water channel.

Besides the white-fronted geese seen feeding who were local birds that would be nesting in a couple weeks, several flocks were seen moving west. There were also a few snow geese  mixed in with these white-fronts  heading farther to the west  to nest.

         Greater White-fronted Geese

                                                    Snow Geese migrating westward.

I covered 14 miles in my travels and saw three new “first of the year”  birds on my travels. They were a pair of Hoary Redpolls feeding on grass seeds poking out of a snow patch, a flock of Pomarine  Jaegers (Stercorarius pomarinus) migrating east, and a pair of Tundra Swans traveling further to the west.

    

       There were a few dark phase individuals in the flock of Pomarine’s , but the majority of them were the light phase with their white bellies.

 

 

Most of the Willow Ptarmigan (Lagopus  lagopus) I saw were males on territory and the females were near by I’m sure hiding in the patch work of snow and bare tundra.  I did find one pair and I was able to get a photo of her. She still has a ways to go to get changed into her summer plumage.

 

 

    Female willow ptarmigan changing into her summer plumage.

 

 

On the way back home I stopped at a nice dry bluff to see what might be starting to turn green. Grasses are not showing any new growth yet, but I found several fresh moth cocoons and puffball mushrooms from last fall that showed the hole blown out in the top when dispersing  their spores before freeze up.

From this location I took a photo back towards the homestead, which was 3.5 miles away to show how much snow still covered the tundra.  Overall it was a wonderful trip and besides the birds, I also saw 1 red fox and 15 arctic ground squirrels.

Spring Flooding 2013

 

Our winter wasn’t as cold as last years, but we had more snow which set us up for serious flooding if the right conditions were met.  Winter did not want to leave and we were still  having very cold temperatures into the month of May. Usually we experience a few days of melting at the end of April or beginning  of May, not this year.  On the first of May the night time temperature dropped to –20F/ –29C  and  it wasn’t until after the middle of May before we had temperatures getting above freezing.  On the 1st of May I took the monthly ice thickness in the Colville River by our house and even with 17 inches/43cm of snow on top of the ice it was still  68 inches/172.7cm thick.

                                                     Standing on snow machine to start the drilling operation to get through the   thick ice.

The early arriving Greater White-fronted Geese had a rough two weeks before there was much melting providing water and bare ground for feeding.  Our Snow Buntings were three weeks later  than the yearly average with the first male showing up at the feeder on May 6th.

 

   Male Snow Buntings waiting out a  breezy snow squall.

 

 

 

A group of Black Brant with a pair of Snow Geese feeding in a small patch of melted out tundra before breakup.

 

When the weather finally turned warm at the end of May it stayed warm, not even freezing at night so the spring runoff  was rapid and this led to our second worst flood in the past two decades.  We live on a island in the Colville Delta and over 85%   of the island was covered in water.  Several of the waterfowl nesting areas were flooded with several feet of water and many of the early nesters lost their nests. 

 

      Brant flying over a white landscape.

 

 

 

 

River starting to flood its banks with a small group of King eiders resting on a small pan of river ice.

 

 

 

   Local breeding Brant flocking up on some of the last high ground during this years flood.

 

 

 

View showing water around some of the buildings and flooded runway in the center of the photo.

 

 

 

    A flock of King Eiders in the edge of the flooded lake by our house.

 

 

 

Fortunately most were just starting and were able to continue once the water levels receded, although many of the clutch were smaller than in a normal  year. 

         A female Brant starting her second attempt to lay eggs this spring.  She now has two eggs and is starting to add down from her breast to help insulate the eggs  while incubating.  She also covers the eggs with the down when she leaves the nest to go bath and feed for short periods several times a day.  The down will keep the eggs warm for several hours.

 

I will end with a photo showing our island and lake when it is dry and green.

Nesting Season Underway

Breakup turned out to be on the mild side this year and we enjoyed one of the few non-flooding ones we have had in the last 15 years.  Once we had our initial flooding, we still had 12 days to go before reaching the final breakup and all of the ice disappeared from the river channels.  The weather remained overcast and cool right up to the day before ice went out.  Then with a week of clear skies, warm nights, and temperatures up to +56F, our snow pack receded rapidly and by the end of the week the only snow left was from the deep drifts around all the buildings.

As the tundra rapidly emerged from under the snow, the geese started building nests and laying eggs.  The late spring seems to have depleted some of the Greater White-fronted Geese’s body reserves for egg laying, and the clutches have been much smaller than normal.  Last year the average clutch was 6, and I even found clutch counts as high as 10.  This spring most White-front nests are running between 2-3 eggs, which is quite a drop in production. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Above is a photo of a White-fronted Goose nest, and to the right is a gander trying to draw attention away from setting female.

 

 

The Snow Goose is the other  large goose that nests in our local area, and while they arrived about two weeks behind the White-fronts, their clutch size seems to be down by about 30%.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above shot shows a pair of Snows and the male is a blue morph.  Photo to the right shows a Snow Goose nest with the white down used to cover the eggs when female is off the nest.

 

The Brant arrived much later than the White-fronts and their egg production is normal, with an average of 4 eggs per nest.  Out of several hundred Brant nests, the highest count so far has been 5, and a very few 2 egg counts have been found.   At this time it looks like it is going to be a very good year for the Brant colony.

A Brant nest showing the dark speckled down and how much more down the Brant have in their nests, compared to other geese. Nest on mound with old Caribou skull.

Other waterfowl that will be nesting near by are Greater Scaup, Long-tailed Duck, Northern Pintail, the lovely King Eider and perhaps this year for the first time since 2003 we might have a Spectacled Eider nesting near our lake.

         Two male King Eiders tussling over females.

With nest boxes available, the Snow Buntings were the first to start nesting and some of the  eggs should be hatching shortly. Both the Savannah Sparrow and Lapland Longspur are also nesting, but I have only found Longspur nests so far this spring.

The Semipalmated Sandpipers were the first shorebirds to start nesting and it looks like it will be another good year for them, as I have already found several nests in a small area around our Lodge. 

          A well hidden Semipalmated Sandpiper Nest.

Some of the other shorebirds near-by the lodge that are “on territory” and will be nesting shortly, if not already started, are Pectoral, Dunlin, Red-necked Phalarope, Red Phalarope, and Black-bellied Plover.  I have seen Long-billed Dowitchers, and Stilts close by also, so perhaps we will get a nest from one of them.  All the Ruddy Turnstones seem to have moved off to other islands to nest, with just the odd one or two that are still coming into the feeder for a quick bite. 

Today I watched a female Hoary Redpoll pulling long dog hair from one of the willow bushes by the house, so she is working to line her nest, thus should be laying in the next day or two.  She is probably the only Hoary to line her nest with silky Pyrenees dog hair!

Remember, we now have 24-hour daylight…the land of the mid-night sun. This is a time of year filled with bird songs and there is never a time when birds cannot be heard, photographed, or just observed.   Shortly the yard and surrounding area will be full of young Snow Buntings begging to be fed.

 

 

 

Willow Catkin, the first flowering plant by the house this year.

A new Season Starting

Winter is finally loosening its grip, and with the warm weather in the Brooks Range, the Colville River next to our home has started the first stages of breakup.  The start of breakup for us is the flooding of the shallow parts of the river where the ice has frozen down to the river bottom during the winter. This “overflow” occurs as the water pressure from up-river continues to increase and the channel ice over the deeper parts of the river lifts up. 

 

The ice needs to lift up between two and half and three feet before it will crack and let the water flow out over the frozen-down areas.

 

Start of breakup-first water

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                 Clear brackish water boiling out of a blowhole.

Some of the shore leads created at this time can be over a half mile wide. Since the Colville has very little flow in the winter, the delta fills with brackish water from the Arctic Ocean during the winter months and the first water to flow up on the ice is clear greenish-blue color.  It usually take from 1-2 days to flush the brackish water out of the delta after which the water becomes a dirty brown.  Then it usually takes another week for the ice to weaken enough to break up and move out into the ocean.

Dark waters are shore leads, white channel ice over the deep water.

During the last wind storm, just before the river flooded, we had a special treat when a female Muskox and her calf showed up and spent four days in our local area. During the first two days they were here, it was storming so hard it was difficult to see them in the blowing snow. When they were lying down they were quickly covered with snow and blended in even more.   When the storm broke, the cow and calf continued making their way to the west and were on an island west of us when the river flooded. 

 Upper  photo shows female Muskox with snow packed in her pelt. Bottom photo was taken two days later, still whiteout but the wind has died down and they are enjoying a warmer day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

With our cold spring and heavy snow cover, the waterfowl were happy to see the river flood, and many White-fronted Geese and Brant were seen out bathing in flood water.  Even with a few days of warm weather and melting during the day, the ground is nearly 95% snow covered, with only the higher polygon ridges and grass tussocks melted out.

The number of birds around our feeders at one time has started to decline, as birds pair up and move out onto their nesting territories.  Our Lapland Longspur numbers peaked at around 150 during some of the worst parts of last week’s snow storm, and now we might see 15-20 at one time, with many birds shifting in and out of the feeders.

The Brant are our most numerous species now, with over 600 within sight of the house, either feeding along the river- banks or staking out nest sites in the nesting colonies.  With this many Brant here already we should have an early hatch this year.  

                          A pair of Brant

Break-up Over

This morning (May 27th) the last of the up-river channel ice drifted by and the river is open to boating above the Lodge.  The channel is still plugged with ice on down stream of the house to the ocean.  It was a long, drawn-out process this year, but in the end the only thing that was impacted was the runway being under water for several days.  Depending on weather, it could take up to two weeks for all of the runway to dry out and be usable. 

Yesterday morning we awoke to 4.5 inches of fresh and very wet snow on the ground and the area was back to 100% snow cover.  This brought the Ruddy Turnstones and Lapland Longspurs back to the feeders in large numbers.  Many of the longspurs were just staying by the feeders, roosting out of the wind and snow and not going back out to their territories.  With over 50 turnstones feeding with the Snow Buntings and longspurs it took lots of seed and fish to get through the stormy day.  By late evening, clearing skies warmed up the day and with the ensuing melting the feeder birds started moving back out on the tundra.

Even with all the stormy weather, more birds have arrived and we now have over 250 pair of brant.  They, along with the other geese (white-fronted and snow), are busy checking out nesting spots in the surrounding nesting areas.  New birds are American Golden Plover, Long-billed Dowitcher, Red Phalarope, Northern Pintail, Long-tailed Duck, Savanna Sparrow, and today our first pair of King Eiders.

Pair of Red Phalarope’s  just returned to the Arctic. 

Male Lapland Longspurs waiting out the storm near the feeders.

Break-up Weather

After two beautiful warm sunny days we are back to more normal break-up weather, low stratus and fog. The cloud cover made for a cooler day and we had a high of +31F, which slowed the melting process. The warm days in the Brooks Range restarted break-up and the water in the river has been on the rise all day and by 9 PM approaching the 4’ level. Here on our low delta island a 4.5’ water level will start flooding in the lower areas of the island, and 5’ will have the runway under water.

Other than the local white-fronted geese and snow geese, there hasn’t been much movement of water fowl for the past two days. Most took advantage of the break in the weather earlier in the week to move on west. The local birds are busy checking out the near islands for nesting sites, and just local movement from there to areas that have melted out for better feeding.

May18-19; We had two sparrows show up early morning on the 18th, a American Tree Sparrow and a white-crowned Sparrow. It was nice to hear them singing for the two days they were around. On the 19th an American Robin showed up, the first in several years. The robin was only here for the day. With the warm weather and melting, the birds weren’t that dependent on the feeders. The Ruddy Turnstones also continued to move through much more rapidly than I thought they would with all the snow that is still on the ground. There was just enough melting and warmth to keep them moving and not hanging around the feeders like they do when cold, snowy weather holds them. Only male Lapland Longspurs have arrived so far and only about 10 are around drifting in and out of the feeder.

As of May 21, we now have three pairs of Tundra swans in the local area and you can hear them calling and watch as a pair sends trespassing swans on their way.

Break-up is the next major item for us to get through. We have been busy getting those things that could be damaged by water moved around and up on higher ground.

Jim