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El Perkele posted:Hasn't been answered, isn't this 1st winter Franklin (tail, very white underparts, head colouration). Thanks, that's what I figured. Just thought it would be cool if it was a Laughing since they've been spotted in every surrounding county but mine (it's really under-birded here, tons of opportunities for new county records!)
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Dec 12, 2013 17:15
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 16:14 |
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Tardigrade posted:Peregrines prefer to hunt birds, but the impact they have on game/domestic birds is negligible and overexaggerated by people. Hawks hunt mammals, which is why they weren't hit as hard as falcons and accipiters. I ought to take a picture of this old ad I have framed in my house. It's a drawing of a Peregrine nailing a duck mid-flight and the heading is DUCK FOOD or something like that. If you go on to read the article, it's kind of a public service announcement for hunters telling them to shoot all hawks on sight because they're killing the ducks the hunters want to shoot. This was printed in popular hunting magazines and was once an acceptable form of "game management".
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Dec 18, 2013 21:42
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Here's the picture I mentioned above.
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Dec 21, 2013 21:19
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BeastOfExmoor posted:That's kind of nauseating. In my experience modern hunters in the US tend to be in awe of raptors rather than viewing them as the enemy. There's certainly still dipshits around that want to shoot everything that moves, but they're few and far between. I tend to agree with you. 99.9% of hunters follow the law and are very interested in the conservation of all wildlife, not just game species. I still know quite a few people who shoot hawks and other non-game species and they'll straight up admit it. I work with ranchers and you'd be surprised at the amount of flat-out WRONG information a lot of the old-timers have. Mainly old white dudes in their 60s-70s, they're the worst offenders. The ones who say things like "Well my grandfather/Dad did it this way and it worked for them so why should I do it any differently?" You would think these people that live off the land and have for generations would be a little more enlightened than your average hunter who doesn't farm/ranch for a living but nope. I've had people tell me that they shoot Northern Harriers because they kill... I don't even remember, prairie chickens or something? Which they do on occasion but so what? It's like that duck poster - shoot them so they don't kill the things you want to kill. I've had landowners tell me they've shot turkey vultures (why???), and one told me he shot a turkey and it had baby prairie chickens in its stomach (no matter that turkey season is not during prairie-chicken nesting season and also that turkeys don't eat baby prairie chickens). I also had a guy tell me he PERSONALLY WITNESSED a turkey stomp to pieces a prairie-chicken nest full of eggs. So therefore we have a turkey problem so it's okay for everyone to shoot more turkeys any time of year. It's insane the flat out LIES these people say. And if you ask them to elaborate they'll be like "oh well it wasn't ME that saw it but I swear my brother did!". And I have heard from MULTIPLE old ranchers that turkeys eat quail and if you want to get quail back on your property you need to kill all the turkeys. Don't concern yourself with the fact that your land management practices have removed almost all the quail nesting habitat on your property, that can't be the reason. It can't be HUMAN'S fault, it must be the turkeys. I know a group of ranchers who for some reason think they need to shoot brown-headed cowbirds, why I have no idea. One guy told me he was shooting them and went to get the dead bird and it was a LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE! How can you not tell the difference? They just indiscriminately shoot anything and say "well we're shooting cowbirds to protect the other prairie birds!" but in reality they're just out killing things and I hate these people. They don't care about protecting Dickcissels or whatever the hell their "goal" is. Studies on cowbird removal programs in the prairie states have shown that they don't really work, the cowbird removal programs do work for sensitive species like Kirtland's Warblers but in the prairie where I work, nope doesn't matter how many you remove. And cowbirds aren't even a problem here. Yeah they parasitize grassland bird nests but they're native and have done so for a million years and everyone is fine. Come work with these old rear end farmers and ranchers and enjoy pulling your hair out and hearing horror stories about guys killing 15 turkeys at a time or whatever. They WILL NOT listen to "facts" from "city people". That's exactly what they say. "Oh you work for Kansas State? Well I've lived out here my whole life and blah blah blah what do you know? You're from the CITY."
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Dec 29, 2013 17:05
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It's not a Common Nighthawk. How big was it? Did you see it fly? Chuck-Wills-Widows are HUGE compared to all the other nightjars. Looks like a either Common Poorwill or Whip-Poor-Will to me just by the way it's sitting and the coloration but hopefully someone else more knowledgeable will know. Did it have any white on the tail that you notice when it flushed? Common Poorwills have VERY obvious white corners on their tails.
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Jan 2, 2014 01:53
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EPICAC posted:Sorry for the late reply, I was at my parent's house and their internet is unbearably slow. The wings were also not the right shape for a Common Night-Hawk, and the size seemed too small for a Chuck-Wills-Widow. I didn't get a good look at field marks in flight. It was flying towards the sun and he silhouette was really all that was visible. Not sure what Whip-Poor-Wills are like in flight, but Poorwills have a really floppy, slow, moth-like flight. And yes Poorwills can go into a state of torpor. At least one native american tribe's name for the Poorwill meant "The Sleeping One".
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Jan 6, 2014 01:08
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the yeti posted:Worst people in general, really, but yeah you can't trust a single word from an old redneck or rancher about wildlife. It's turkeys eating quail and "cottonmouths" and hoop snakes all the way down. I had an old dude in Missouri tell me he had mountain lions on his property. On his tiny 80 acre "ranch" that was all row corn and surrounded by miles of the same. I just happened to be working on a project tracking mammals and we had track plates all around his property. We saw lots of cat tracks alright... domestic cat tracks.
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Jan 23, 2014 04:34
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BeastOfExmoor posted:Beak looked too large to me, but upon actual comparison with a field guide I concur on Indigo Bunting. BetterLekNextTime posted:Well I'm starting my field season again in Wyoming- not very birdy now but there have been reports of a Gyrfalcon in the area so that's something...  . But... I start my new full-time job in a month, working with local landowners to preserve habitat for Lesser Prairie-chickens in New Mexico. Anyway, I have not been birding lately, what with buckling down on finishing up my thesis and trying to prepare for this move. But I did sit out on my porch the other day to get some incredibly up-close shots of some of the locals. Harris's Sparrow  American Tree Sparrow  Dark-eyed Junco 
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Mar 8, 2014 04:42
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 16:14 |
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Lesser Prairie-chickens in Roosevelt County, NM. Big: http://imgur.com/2VNK3Bh
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Apr 19, 2014 23:59
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