Slow Birding: the Art and Science of Enjoying the Birds in Your Own Backyard by Joan E. Strassmann

Author:Joan E. Strassmann [Strassmann, Joan E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2022-10-25T00:00:00+00:00

NORTHERN CARDINAL ACTIVITIES FOR SLOW BIRDERS

1. Watch them. Northern Cardinals and American Robins may be the easiest two birds to watch because they are common, large, and live right alongside us, often nesting quite low. Cardinals also stick to their territories for most of the year and eat from our feeders.

2. Observe how they behave at feeders. Put black-oil sunflower seeds in your feeder for your cardinals. Then just watch them. Males and females are easily distinguished and stick together through the year. See what they do. Do they go together to the feeder, or does one hang back in the bushes? Does the male bring a seed and feed it to the female? Watch a cardinal for a while to see where it goes. It probably won’t go far. How close together are the male and female? My cardinals love the elderberry over the patio and seldom visit the feeder together.

3. Listen to their song. The male sings nearly all year, skipping only the most wintry months. I didn’t fully appreciate cardinal song at first, thinking it all the same. But now I pay attention and see how wrong I was. Maybe you can record the song with your smartphone and see what the patterns are. You can get a few songs from your bird book app, or from Merlin. If you would like more songs and sounds to study, you can go to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Macaulay Library, https://www.macaulaylibrary.org/. Or you can look at xeno-canto, https://xeno-canto.org/.

4. Find a singing female. Listen early in the spring, or if you find a nest, maybe you can catch her singing to her male to call him in to feed her and the young. The nests are often so low and accessible that they can be easily observed from afar with binoculars. It is important not to disturb them. If the nest is deep in a bush so it cannot be seen, you can still tell what is happening by watching the parents fly in and listening to them sing to each other. If you can see the nest, you can record the timing of nest building, egg laying, hatching, and fledging. Sadly, odds are a predator will take the eggs or chicks before they leave the nest. Then try to see where your cardinals nest next. If you aren’t already friends with your neighbors, you might have to make friends with them so you can look in their backyards too. Remember, the more native bushes you have, the more likely you are to attract nesting birds. You could also do detailed watches, perhaps for half an hour every other day at the same time, just to see exactly what the birds do, how long eggs are incubated, how often the male brings the female food, and later, how often the chicks are fed. Just remember not to get too close or interfere.

5. Compare rural to backyard birds. Once you know your garden Northern Cardinals, it can be fun to watch more rural birds.

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