Jack Greene, Author at Wild About Utah

January 18, 2021September 17, 2023

Common Starlings

It all began so innocently. Let’s bring over a few European starlings to add authenticity for a Shakespearean theatrical. That was 1890. Today, North America has about half of the world population of starlings, approaching a few hundred million.

Following many years of demonizing this bird, I have become convinced they do have value beyond compost. In fact, they are utterly fascinating. My first glimmer came when a friend suggested I read “Arnie, the Darling Starling”. I have yet to read it, but he convinced me this bird was worth taking a second look.

European Starling, Sturnus vulgaris, Courtesy & © Hilary Shughart, Photographer — European Starling, Sturnus vulgaris,
Courtesy & © Hilary Shughart, Photographer”

Since that time in the mid 70’s, I’ve witnessed many of the starling’s remarkable behaviors. It possesses a maddening ability to imitate other birds- killdeer, red tail hawk, evening grosbeak, etc., with such accuracy I always stop to look for a killdeer perched in a tree- gotcha Jack! The starling’s gift for mimicry has long been recognised. Mozart had a pet starling which could sing part of his Piano Concerto in G Major. He became very attached to the bird and arranged an elaborate funeral for it when it died three years later.

Starlings are commonly kept as pets in Europe and widely used as laboratory animals, second only to pigeons. Austrian ethologist Konrad Lorenz wrote of them in his book King Solomon’s Ring as “the poor man’s dog” and “something to love”. Their inquisitiveness makes them easy to train or study.

Starling Murmuration Courtesy Wikimedia and Copyright Walter Baxter Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license — Starling Murmuration
Courtesy Wikimedia and Copyright Walter Baxter
Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license

I’ve always been amazed by their immense winter flocks called murmurations- thousands of birds reminiscent of what the now extinct passenger pigeons must have resembled, and for these massive bird clouds to change form and direction in milliseconds, which I observed when a merlin falcon plummeted into an enormous flock that split in half. I stood in disbelief as the cloud morphed, then saw the merlin emerge just below the bifurcated cloud.

The starling has 12 subspecies breeding in open habitats across its native range in temperate Europe to western Mongolia, and it has been introduced to seven other countries from Australia to Fiji.

Major declines in populations have occurred from 1980 onward in much of Europe and Eurasia. The decline appears to be caused by intensive farming methods used in northern Europe, and the reduced supply of grassland invertebrates needed for the nestlings. This in contrast to 1949, when so many starlings landed on the clock hands of London’s Big Ben that it stopped the clock!
Our love hate starling relationships are evident in how various countries view them. In Spain, starlings are hunted commercially as a food item. In France, it is classified as a pest, and can be killed throughout most of the year. In Great Britain, Starlings are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act. In 2008, the United States government killed 1.7 million starlings, the largest number of any nuisance species to be culled.

A closing note- starlings are trapped for food in some Arab countries. The meat is tough and of low quality, so it is casseroled or made into pâté. Even when correctly prepared, it may still be seen as an acquired taste. You may wish to remove them from your grocery list.

Jack Greene for Bridgerland Audubon Society, and I’m wild about Utah’s not so wild starlings!

Credits:

Pictures: Courtesy US FWS, Dave Menke, Photographer
Pictures: Courtesy US FWS, Lee Karney, Photographer
Pictures: Courtesy Wikimedia and Copyright Walter Baxter, Photographer (Licensed Under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Starling_murmuration.jpg
Audio: Courtesy & © Kevin Colver https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/collections/special-collections
Text: Jack Greene, Jack Greene, Bridgerland Audubon Society & Utah State University Sustainability
Additional Links: Lyle Bingham, Webmaster, Bridgerland Audubon Society, Wild About Utah,

Additional Reading:

Grant, Val, Short-tailed Bird of Perdition-Starlings, Wild About Utah, June 5, 2009, https://wildaboututah.org/short-tailed-bird-of-perdition-starlings/

European Starling, Sturnus vulgaris, Julia Butler Hansen Refuge, US Fish and Wildlife Service, US Department of the Interior, https://www.fws.gov/refuge/julia_butler_hansen/wildlife_and_habitat/habitats/birds/european_starling.html

King, Barbara J., Video: Swooping Starlings In Murmuration, National Public Radio (NPR), January 4, 2017 2:29 PM ET, https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/01/04/506400719/video-swooping-starlings-in-murmuration

European Starling, BirdWeb, https://www.birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/european_starling

Sigl Corbo, Margarete(Author), Barras, Diane Marie(Author), Morrill, Leslie(Illustrator), Arnie, the Darling Starling, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, November 1, 1983, https://www.amazon.com/Arnie-Darling-Starling-Margarete-Corbo/dp/0395343909

December 21, 2020March 12, 2022

Juncos

I first became aware of dark eyed juncos while doing fieldwork for the USFS in Montana. My young children discovered an active nest on the ground near a mountain stream. This was before my birding days. It occurred to me this was a strange place for a small, sparrow sized bird to build a nest, giving predators the advantage. Yet they flourish, and are among the most common and prolific songbirds in north America.

Juncos: Dark-eyed 'Oregon' Junco Male, Junco hyemalis montanus, Courtesy and copyright 2008 Ryan P. O'Donnell, Photographer — Dark-eyed ‘Oregon’ Junco Male, Junco hyemalis montanus, Courtesy and copyright 2008 Ryan P. O’Donnell, Photographer

Now, many years later, I enjoy them at my feeder as they migrate down from the high country to winter in my backyard. I’ve found them to be very chatty with constant vocalizations being exchanged. A friend spent her PhD work on their chatter and discovered 23 sound variations representing different messages. I’m guessing there are many more if one includes nonverbal means of communicating and possible notes beyond our range of hearing.

Another fascinating discovery was how different individual juncos were as I handled those captured in a mist net for banding purposes. Some were quite belligerent biting and struggling throughout the experience. Others were very docile. I imagined them to be smiling throughout the ordeal.

The Dark-eyed Junco can be found across the continent, from Alaska to Mexico, from California to New York. A recent estimate set the junco’s total population at approximately 630 million individuals, about double the U.S. human population.

Belonging to the sparrow family Passerellidae, Junco systematics are still confusing after decades of research, with various authors accepting between three and 12 species. There is a huge range of geographic variation in the Dark-eyed Junco. Among the 15 described races, six forms are easily recognizable in the field and five used to be considered separate species until the 1980s.

Primarily ground feeders, in winter they become highly social often foraging in flocks, evident as masses attack my feeder, and each other! Their breeding habitat is coniferous or mixed forest areas, ranging from subarctic taiga to high-altitude mountain forests in Mexico and Central America south to Panama. The Oregon Dark-eyed Junco, along with the Slate-colored, are the two most widely known subspecies.

The oldest recorded Dark-eyed Junco was at least 11 years, 4 months old when it was recaptured and rereleased during banding operations in West Virginia in 2001.

Juncos are described as “happy, bubbly, little birds that are a joy to watch”. All races and species share a pink bill as well as pink legs, a reminder that no matter how different two things look, they are not all that different on the inside. Please enjoy your juncos and happy holidays!

Jack Greene for Bridgerland Audubon Society, and I’m always wild about wild things in Utah!

Credits:

Nest Picture: Courtesy US FWS, Carla Stanley, Photographer
Junco Picture: Courtesy & © Ryan P O’Donnell, Photographer
Audio: Courtesy and Copyright Kevin Colver
Text: Jack Greene, Bridgerland Audubon Society
Additional Reading: Lyle W Bingham, Webmaster

Additional Reading:

Liberatore, Andrea, Dark-Eyed Juncos, Wild About Utah, January 12, 2012, https://wildaboututah.org/dark-eyed-juncos/

Greene, Jack, Seasonal Changes and Amazing Adaptations, Wild About Utah, Nov 9, 2015, https://wildaboututah.org/seasonal-changes-amazing-adaptations/

Atwell, J.W., O’Neal, D.M, and Ketterson, E.D. (2011) Animal Migration as a Moving Target for Conservation: Intra-species Variation and Responses to Environmental Change, as Illustrated in a Sometimes Migratory Songbird. Environmental Law. Vol. 41:289 p. 289-319, https://www.amazon.com/Animal-migration-moving-target-conservation/dp/B005C29H7I

Alderfer, Jonathan (editor) (2005) National Geographic Complete Book of Birds. National Geographic Press. Dark-eyed junco information available online at: https://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/birding/dark-eyed-junco/

Cornell Lab of Ornithology, All About Birds: Dark-eyed Junco. https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Dark-eyed_Junco/id/ac

History of Name Changes for Juncos. Cornell Lab of Ornithology. https://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/News/junco_taxonomy.pdf

November 16, 2020March 12, 2022

I Love Snow

Snow at Bryce Canyon National Park Courtesy NOAA, Mark Stacey, Photographer — Snow at Bryce Canyon National Park
Courtesy NOAA, Mark Stacey, Photographer

I love snow! It began when I was old enough to know the difference, and has continued since. We kids always celebrated the first snow of the year at our home in northern Wisconsin. We waded through it, ate it, made snow angels, looked for the most beautiful snowflake, dug snow caves, and waited for a warm up so we could make snowballs, snow people, and snow forts. Once it got deep enough, we broke out the 6-person toboggan and trudged up the biggest hill we could find. And we couldn’t imagine a Christmas without snow!

When we moved to Cache Valley Utah 34 years ago, I was delighted to learn of its superb snow, reminiscent of N. Wisconsin. Further, I learned of its life and death importance for wildlife. Too much, or too little could spell doom for many of our critters. In a heavy snow year, our deer fawn crop may take a major hit- up to 80% mortality, while small mammals can thrive. Snow is an excellent insulator when deep enough- 8 inches or so will maintain a subnivean (beneath the snow) temperature of 32 degrees when the ambient temperatures plunge well below zero above. Further, they are better protected from predators. Too little snow tells a reverse story- great for predators, but disastrous for their prey.

Snow isn’t just snow. According to those who live in the high latitudes- Eskimos, Siberians, and Scandinavians, they have between 180 and 300 words for different types of snow. As a skier, I have a few myself- powder, crusty, gropple, corn snow, and slush. I’m sure you can guess which of these I prefer.

Utah is world renowned for its extraordinary, low moisture powder- less than 8% water. You’re basically skiing on air. I’m aware of only one other location that beats us- Japan’s Hokkaido mountains with only 4% water content.
Another element of snowfall for the Wasatch front results from the very large lake to our west. Thanks to the Great Salt Lake, our snowfall gets a considerable boost from latent heat and added moisture from this great lake. Additionally, airborne salt particles enhance the formation of snow producing clouds.

I must share an extremely strange and rare phenomenon referred to as “thundersnow”. While skiing the North Ogden bench many years ago, an approaching ominous cloud delivered lightning and thunder, shaking the ground enough to bring up swarms of worms to the snow surface. It took a double take to realize what I was witnessing!
Another strange snow phenomenon is an avalanche. This once soft, pliable medium instantly transformed to cement as the avalanche settles. The friction of sliding snow removes the snowflake crystalline structure, changing it from fluff to a high-density medium. The friction generated heat melts it enough to form the deadly tomb that has encased many.

As the Great Salt Lake shrinks from stream diversions and a warming climate, combined with a dwindling winter season, I cannot help but wonder what will become of our indispensable mountain snowpack, essential for Utah’s water supply and our winter recreation.

Jack Greene for the Bridgerland Audubon Sociey, and I’m wild about Utah’s Snow!

Credits:

Images: Courtesy NOAA, Mark Stacey, Photographer (2011)
Audio: Contains Audio Courtesy and Copyright Friend Weller
Text: Jack Greene, USU Sustainability and Bridgerland Audubon Society

Additional Reading:

Boling, Josh, Snowshoes and Adaptations, Wild About Utah, February 17, 2020, https://wildaboututah.org/snowshoes-and-adaptations/

Cane, Jim, Kervin, Linda, Graupel Snow, Wild About Utah, March 3, 2011, https://wildaboututah.org/graupel-snow/

Cane, Jim, Kervin, Linda, SNOTEL Snowpack Recording Stations, Wild About Utah, February 7, 2013, https://wildaboututah.org/snotel-snowpack-recording-stations/

Liberatore, Andrea, Snowflakes, Wild About Utah, March 10, 2011, https://wildaboututah.org/snowflakes/

Mahoney, Ru, Best Snow, Wild About Utah, November 24, 2014, https://wildaboututah.org/best-snow/

Strand, Holly, Baby, It’s Cold Outside, Wild About Utah, January 17, 2013, https://wildaboututah.org/baby-its-cold-outside/

Strand, Holly, Colorado vs. Utah Snow, Wild About Utah, December 16, 2010, https://wildaboututah.org/colorado-vs-utah-snow/

Thundersnow, Weird Weather – NOAA Satellites Keep Watch When Weather Gets Weird, March 26, 2018, National Environmental Satellite Data and Information Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, US Department of Commerce, https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/content/weird-weather-noaa-satellites-keep-watch-when-weather-gets-weird

September 14, 2020March 12, 2022

Insect Musicians

It gives me great pleasure to take a moonlight walk on these warm summer nights, serenaded by a gazillion insect musicians. Pulsing in unison with a background of cricket chirps, it reminds me that summer is waning and I must enjoy what remains!

As birds grow silent with nesting season past, I become aware of the gradually intensifying chorus of the inset tribe- a cacophonous mixture of chirps, trills, ticks, scrapes, shuffles, and buzzes. What a joy to behold these choruses of males, serenading females of their own species until cold weather dampens the chorus and heavy frost finally brings it to a close. Crickets, katydids, grasshoppers, and cicadas are prominent songsters. They can be found in trees, shrubs, lawns, fields, woodlands—nearly all habitats, and sometimes inside our homes.

My USU entomologist friend recommends the Snowy Tree Cricket as a champion night chorister here among the insects. It’s “snowy” name is derived from its pale coloration causing it to appear white. Snowy Tree Crickets sing from brushy understory plants at forested margins or within open woodlands. During cold spells, they can be found close to the ground on the trunks of small trees where they find a warmer micro-climate. It is also referred to as the “thermometer cricket” due to its accuracy of giving the temperature in degrees F. Just count the chirps for 15 seconds and add 40.

Jerusalem Cricket Orthoptera: Stenopelmatidae Copyright 2013 Holly Strand — Jerusalem Cricket
Orthoptera: Stenopelmatidae
Copyright 2013 Holly Strand

The Spring and Fall Field Crickets are next in line as musicians. They look very similar to each other, but are two different species. The season they appear helps identify them. Another difference is their life histories. Fall Field Crickets overwinter as eggs while the Spring version as nymphs.

Spring Field Crickets develop quickly when warm weather arrives and adults typically appear and begin singing and mating in late spring, continuing until late June or early July when they finish laying eggs and die off. In contrast, Fall Field Crickets hatch in the spring, and adults don’t appear and begin singing until mid to late July, after which they continue singing and mating into the autumn, when they are finally killed by frosts. In most areas of overlap, there is a period of silence in midsummer when neither species is heard.

Finding and identifying a singing insect can be a fun challenge. With the help of a flashlight and considerable patience, you will be able to track down individual singers, and perhaps even view a singing performance firsthand! Many are small and well camouflaged in their green and brown coats, and they sit motionless when singing, blending into their surroundings. Many sing only in the dark of night. Use LED lights as their spectrum seems to enhance finding them.

Check out these glorious beings at songsofinsects.com.

Jack Greene for Bridgerland Audubon Society, I’m wild about Utah!

Credits:

Images: Katydid, Courtesy US FWS, Dr. Thomas Barnes, Photographer
Images: Jerusalem Cricket, Courtesy & Copyright 2013 Holly Strand
Audio: Courtesy & Copyright Friend Weller, Utah Public Radio
Text: Jack Greene, USU Sustainability Program Volunteer, Bridgerland Audubon Society

Additional Reading:

Hershberger, Wil & Elliott, Lang, Songs of Insects, https://songsofinsects.com/

Montagne, Renee, Insect Sounds: Telling Crickets, Cicadas And Katydids Apart, NPR, September 8, 2015, https://www.npr.org/2015/09/08/438473580/insect-sounds-telling-crickets-cicadas-and-katydids-apart

Rankin, Richard, Bug Bytes, Reference Library of Digitized Insect Sounds – USDA ARS, https://www.ars.usda.gov/ARSUserFiles/3559/soundlibrary.html