On the Wings of Spring
On the Wings of Spring
Robins in the redwoods, migrating geese, a bird-human composition and more about our feathery friends
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This week I’m featuring some bird encounters and resources to enjoy and explore the world of Earth’s feathered species. Thanks for reading Mother E!
Robin Applegarth
A bird does not sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song. Maya Angelou, poet
ONE TWILIGHT EVE THIS WEEK, I stepped onto my porch and heard a chorus of bright chirping through the redwoods. Robins! Were they gathering around a bonanza insect find before settling to roost for the night? Or maybe it was their celebratory hour—a "we've had a good day" moment— as the soft cloak of evening laid its long shadows over the forest.
As the robins chirped away while the light faded, I reflected on what birds mean to us. They're the most vocal part of nature. Their songs, peeps, tweets, honks, and calls are especially evident in the springtime when they are busy mating, nest-building, and feeding baby birds. Their ever-present sounds are the backdrop of life on Earth.
I recently watched over a dozen robins foraging together for worms and bugs after a rain storm, their orange-breasted plumage bright against the overcast morning. They shared the camaraderie of a flock, and their calls were cheery and bright. You can hear an American robin below. (26 seconds)
Merlin, the magical bird wand
I love watching birds but can only identify about 20 by name. If you want help with identification, the free Merlin app is like waving a magic wand to identify a bird. Load it onto your smartphone, then let it record bird sounds and identify the species and offer song types for you.
I've found it especially helpful for small, elusive birds like Brown creepers, chickadees, wrens, and Golden-crowned kinglets. Those kinglets have a song at the top of the human hearing range and maybe beyond it, so a microphone captures its high-pitched call well.
How can one see more shy birds in the wild? Jon Young, naturalist, tracker, and bird expert, shares his lessons learned from a life of bird-watching.
Proceed with respect, pause frequently, turn the eyes away from direct confrontation, and walk with a relaxed body posture. Ease around birds who are feeding ...and try not to disturb those who are singing. We can do better by invoking the golden rule.
Jon Young, author of "What the Robin Knows—How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World."
He says we can learn much about our environment by observing deep bird language, something I wrote about in "What the Songbirds Know."
Honking to Canada
There are some birds it's impossible to miss. The Canadian geese fly in their distinctive V-shaped formation as they migrate north in the spring. Even from thousands of feet above the Earth, their loud honking announces them before they are visible. You might be wondering why geese spend energy honking while flying. Biologist Shoshanah Jacobs speculates it may be to help coordinate position shifts with the V-formation and "maintain the integrity of the flock."
I heard geese approaching last week while I was on a trail, and stopped to search the sky for a sight of them. The V-shape formation advanced swiftly, fluidly wavering as the birds shifted position slightly yet kept pressing on with a single-minded purpose. They traveled at upwards of 40 mph.
Their piercing, honking calls reverberated in my mind for an hour afterwards. Each geese-viewing encounter feels like a gift from the natural world and a reminder that other species have goals and lives of purpose too.
Geese always support each other. When a goose gets injured two birds always accompany it down to the ground. Just as geese do, we must support each other.
The intelligence of birds is evident in their capabilities—nest designing, food gathering, migrations across countries and continents, and their largely peaceful social lives. It’s time to respect the intelligence of birds and other species, asking what we can learn from them and sharing their habitat or carving out places for them to have a better chance to thrive.
Bring back the birds, their songs, and ecosystem services
Birds are a barometer of a healthy ecosystem, and the population drop/loss of three billion birds since 1970 needs to be stopped if we value them as well as our own future. Our lives are intertwined in unexpected ways. Losing too many species can have a Jenga toppling effect.
Birds need areas with plant cover and natural habitats with favored food sources. We can all help create bird havens by:
Planting/keeping greenery that provides food, nesting, and roosting space
Avoiding toxic sprays or products
Keeping cats inside
Leaving some fallen leaf cover for wintering insects, a spring food for some birds.
Where birds thrive, other species will too, helping create a more livable world for all.
Robin Applegarth
Bird resources:
Endangered Bird music— Here's a piano and flute suite composed using the songs of four endangered California birds: Least Bell's Vireo, Belding's Savannah Sparrow, Swainson's Hawk, and the California Black Rail. It’s a bird-human composition!
Birds of the World guide—This is an advanced online resource from Cornell Labs with "scholarly, comprehensive species profiles for every bird in the world," including photos, videos, sound recordings, and migration maps. The number of bird species currently stands at 10,906 birds. If you or someone you know is a "bird nerd," this might make a great gift subscription. Read more about it here.
A storytelling bird book-- The Thing with Feathers, The Surprising Lives of Birds and What They Reveal About Being Human, by Noah Strycker
Bird migration dashboard: Cornell Labs also produces this BirdCast migration map, updated every six hours. How many birds passed overhead last night? When, where, and how far will they go? https://birdcast.info/
Think of the millions of individual birds flying overhead this spring through day and darkness, clouds and rainbows. Learning more about the miracle of migration is both humbling and connects us to a wider world.
I like to hear from readers!
Have you had springtime bird encounters?
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Robin,
Thank you for another wonderful read, always happy to see your essays in my inbox.
I also enjoyed "What the Songbirds Know", and I ordered Young's book.
Merlin is the best isn't it? I've put it to the test several times, and it's never wrong. I'm a long time supporter of Cornell Lab - an amazing resource.
Here at the ranch the always tardy tree swallows arrived this week so the spring roster is now full.
The tree swallows, their cousins the barn swallows along with the meadowlarks, horned larks, kildeer, red-wings, yellow heads, curlews, robins will all hopefully raise a couple broods this summer.