May/June 2023

BirdWatching

Feel the thrill of finding, attracting, and identifying birds

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More To Read On BirdWatchingDaily.com
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently said it will protect the California Spotted Owl under the Endangered Species Act. The move comes after more than two decades of advocacy by environmental groups to protect the owl and its habitat. Bald Eagl
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BirdWatching
Editor Matt Mendenhall Founding Editor Eldon D. Greij, 1937-2021 Contributing Editors Pete Dunne, Laura Erickson, Kimball L. Garrett, Kenn Kaufman, David Allen Sibley, Brian E. Small Senior Graphic Designer Jaron Cote Client Services Manager & Media
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Opportunity Missed
ABOUT A DOZEN years ago, this magazine’s name was changed from Birder’s World to BirdWatching. The move, which was meant to broaden our audience, sparked some angry emails, as I suspect this editorial will, but overall, the decision was positive. Mor
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Possible Gamechanger For Grassland Birds
North America’s grassland birds are disappearing at an alarming rate. Since 1970, more than half of all grassland birds in the United States and Canada have been lost, and species like the Bobolink and Mountain Plover are on track to lose another 50
BirdWatching1 min read
Water: Sustaining Bird Life
The importance of water is the focus of this year’s World Migratory Bird Day, an annual celebration of migratory birds and a call to action to protect them. Throughout 2023, organizers are spreading the message that “water sustains bird life” and hig
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Birding Briefs
The field of ornithology systemically excludes researchers and research from Latin America and the Caribbean, according to a paper published February 7 in Ornithological Applications. The paper, signed by 124 ornithologists (including professional sc
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Fossils Reveal Enormous Penguins
Fossil bones from two newly described penguin species, one of them thought to be the largest penguin to ever live — weighing more than 150 kilograms (330 pounds), more than three times the size of the largest living penguins — have been unearthed in
BirdWatching4 min read
On The Wire
By Cin-Ty Lee, illustrated by Andrew Birch, Princeton University Press, 2023, paperback, 168 pages, $19.95. A daunting bird-ID challenge just got a bit easier. This essential new guide to flycatchers and pewees, which is compact and field-friendly, t
BirdWatching4 min read
More Than Meets The Eye
MY 2-YEAR-OLD GRANDSON has just started playing with fingerpaints. At first, he made discrete blobs of each color that I’d call, say, cardinal red or goldfinch yellow, then discovered that mixing those two creates oriole orange. The pigments in bird
BirdWatching4 min read
Enchanted By Birds
SO, READER, WHEN was the last time you went birdwatching? Not chasing some mega rarity. Not scanning flocks of shorebirds in search of some species that, according to conventional thinking, shouldn’t be there. Just watching birds for the delight it b
BirdWatching2 min read
Software Anticipates Birds’ Migratory Patterns
Computer scientists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, in collaboration with biologists at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, recently announced in the journal Methods in Ecology and Evolution a new, predictive model that is capable of accurate
BirdWatching1 min read
Whiskered Screech-owl At A Glance
As a group, screech-owls do make screeching sounds that they are named for, but they’re not as common as their other vocalizations. Whiskered Screech-Owls give a variety of trills and whistles that are used in pair bonding, to declare territories, an
BirdWatching10 min read
In The Dark
Let’s start with her astonishing eyes. They were huge. If human eyes were as large in our faces, relatively, we’d have eyes the size of large lemons. The yellow of her eyes was so intense, they seemed to glow, electric and incandescent. They were the
BirdWatching8 min read
Big Stakes
It’s summertime on Stellwagen Bank, 50 miles north of Chatham, Massachusetts, in the Atlantic Ocean’s Gulf of Maine. As the sun rises on this late June day, the bank hosts seabirds, many of them Great Shearwaters, and humpback, finback, and minke wha
BirdWatching7 min read
Evading CAPTURE
Birding in the American tropics can be a delightfully distracting experience. Armed with binoculars, bird books, cellphone, camera, and a wish list of birds, birders frequently find their attention diverted by curious monkeys, lizards, treefrogs, and
BirdWatching5 min read
ID TIPS: Gull-billed Tern
ALONG WITH THE Caspian Tern, the Gull-billed Tern has the most extensive breeding range of any non-oceanic tern, yet it is localized, generally uncommon, and unfamiliar to many birders. The species breeds from southern Scandinavia to southern Europe
BirdWatching1 min read
Trials Of The Terns
I’ve spent many a steaming hot late spring and early summer day at California’s Salton Sea for nearly three decades helping my wife, Kathy Molina, monitor and band Gull-billed Terns and study their breeding biology. At this only major land-locked col
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Always Something To See
WHAT TIME OF day is best for birding? Ask anyone, even a non-birder, and the answer will almost always be “at dawn.” I used to repeat this myself, but over the years, I’ve come to realize that it is simply not true. Generally, morning is best, and ea
BirdWatching3 min read
Hotspots Near You
CANNON BEACH, OREGON 45°53'53.29"N 123°57'26.82"W Sitting just a few blocks from the beach, the Cannon Beach Settling Ponds provide freshwater and forest habitats away from the bustle of this charming coastal village. Just as birders visit this site
BirdWatching3 min read
Contest winners
Last fall, we invited birdwatchers and photographers to enter photos in our 2022 Bird Portrait Contest. The response was fantastic. Contestants submitted more than 540 photos of birds. Thanks to all who entered! The selection of images was outstandin
BirdWatching1 min read
Final Frame
Early one morning in late September, wildlife photographer Jim Burns found a Western Grebe that had overnighted at a fishing pond in Maricopa County, Arizona. It was diving for fish, and Burns sat down at the water’s edge, camera in hand, on the off

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