Monthly Archives: April 2016

Pittsburgh’s Redbud Project

April 13, 2016Books & Events, TreesKate St. John

Redbud blooming (photo by Dianne Machesney)

Imagine that Pittsburgh was as beautiful in the spring as Washington, D.C. during the Cherry Blossom Festival.

That’s the vision that local landscape architect Frank Dawson had when he proposed planting eastern redbud trees along Pittsburgh’s riverfronts.

This spring the dream is starting to come true.

Thanks to a grant from Colcom Foundation, the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy is launching the Pittsburgh Redbud Project. From now through Spring 2017 they’ll plant 1,200 eastern redbud and other native trees in Downtown Pittsburgh and along the city’s riverfronts. Everyone who helps through May 12 will get a free seedling. (They’re giving away 1,500 of them!)

Eastern redbuds (Cercis canadensis) are understory trees in the Pea family that bloom in early spring. Native from southern Pennsylvania to eastern Texas, they’re cultivated for their beauty because their rose-pink flowers open on bare branches before the leaves.

Come to the Redbud Project’s Launch Event on Tuesday, April 19 at 10:00am at the Three Rivers Heritage Trail near the Mister Rogers statue. Students and volunteers will plant 60 trees along the riverfront. Attendees get a free redbud seedling. (Click here for more information, here to RSVP.)

Here’s a planting along River Avenue to give you an idea of the beautiful results.

Redbud trees along River Road, Pittsburgh, April 2016 (photo courtesy Western PA Conservancy) — Redbud trees along River Avenue, Pittsburgh, April 2016 (photo courtesy Western PA Conservancy)

More events and volunteer opportunities are coming in the weeks ahead. Click here for a list. Get a free tree!

Soon our Downtown and riverfronts will be transformed.

(photos: redbud flowers’ closeup by Dianne Machesney. Row of redbud trees on River Avenue, courtesy Western Pennsylvania Conservancy)

Pigeons Have A Favorite Foot

April 12, 2016Bird Behavior, Doves & ChickensKate St. John

Rock pigeon hopping down a step (photo by Pimthida via Flickr, Creative Commons license)

12 April 2016

Most of us have a dominant hand that’s our favorite choice for everything that requires skill. About 90% of us use our right hand with only 10% using the left hand or having no preference at all.

Did you know that pigeons (Columba livia) have a favorite foot, but it’s not overwhelmingly the right one?

Pigeon “footedness” was discovered by Harvey I. Fisher at Southern Illinois University in the mid 1950’s while he was looking for something else. In 1954-1955 he was studying the landing force that pigeons exert on a perch, so he recorded the actions of 11 pigeons landing a total of 4,000 times.

That’s when he noticed that most of them extended one foot and landed on it first, and that they had a favorite foot for doing this. He ran more experiments, tallying 7,259 landings.

Seven of the 11 pigeons were right-footed, three were left-footed and one didn’t have a favorite. That’s about 63% right footedness. Read more here in his 1957 article: Footedness in Domestic Pigeons.

I learned this at the Urban Wildlife Guide’s Right-footed Pigeons, and was so intrigued that I bought the book: Field Guide to Urban Wildlife by Julie Feinstein. (I highly recommend it by the way.)

So what do you think? Is this pigeon left-footed? Or is he just tucking his right foot so it doesn’t hit the step?

(photo by Pimthida via Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 license. Click on the image to see the original)

Look For Perching Peregrines

April 11, 2016PeregrinesKate St. John

There's a peregrine in this picture. Can you see him? (photo by Kate St. John) — There’s a peregrine in this picture. Can you see him? (photo by Kate St. John)

Here’s a quiz. And a plea for help.

There’s a peregrine falcon in the picture above. Can you see him?

When I took this photo from an office window last spring I already knew the nest was nearby.

This spring the Downtown Pittsburgh peregrines have moved again. We don’t know where, but we can find the nest if we find a perching peregrine. That’s because the male perches within sight or sound of the nest while the female is incubating.

Within sight(?): On April 6, Trinidad Regaspi saw a peregrine perched on the SPACE Gallery building at 812 Liberty Avenue.

Within sound(?): Yesterday morning at 7:45am, Matt Webb was on his BirdSafe route when he heard a peregrine calling from the direction of the old Horne’s Building at Penn and Stanwix. Doug Cunzolo checked it out an hour later but couldn’t find anything except lots of workmen erecting scaffolding on the building. The workmen were still there when I came by at 5:00pm.

I didn’t find a peregrine yesterday but there are plenty of places to look. That’s why I need your help.

Here’s what to do (as posted last week):

Look up! Or look out of your office window. Look for a perching peregrine. One of the pair will perch in the vicinity of the nest while the other one incubates.

Tips on where to look:
Look at old buildings, probably less than 20 stories. Look at ornate parts of the architecture, window ledges, etc. The peregrines are often camouflaged on ornate buildings.

I do not need to know if you see peregrines flying. (They fly everywhere.) I do need to know where they perch.

Mission impossible? Not if you help.

If you see a perching peregrine, leave a comment telling me where it is and I’ll come Downtown to check.

Keep looking up!

p.s. Even if you don’t live in Pittsburgh, these instructions are good for finding nesting peregrines in cities.

(photo by Kate St. John)

Blue-Eyed Mary in Bloom

April 10, 2016Phenology, Plants & FungiKate St. John

Blue-eyed Mary blooming at Cedar Creek Park, 6 April 2016 (photo by Donna Foyle)

It’s cold this morning — and snowy for some of you — but when the weather improves you’ll find …

Blue-eyed Mary (Collinsia verna) usually blooms in southwestern Pennsylvania from mid April to early May but we found it at Cedar Creek Park on Wednesday April 6.

This annual drops its seeds in summer, germinates seedlings in the fall, and overwinters to bloom in the spring. It spreads by reseeding so you usually find it in patches — that look more green than blue from a distance.

Blue-eyed Mary patch at Cedar Creek Park, 6 April 2016 (photo by Donna Foyle)

Collinsia verna grows in woodlands with light to dappled shade and moist to mesic rich loamy soil. Though the plant can be locally abundant, its habitat can be hard to find. Blue-eyed Mary is endangered in New York and Tennessee.

Here are three places in southwestern Pennsylvania to see Blue-eyed Mary this month:

Cedar Creek Park, Belle Vernon, Westmoreland County
Braddock’s Trail Park, North Huntingdon Township, Westmoreland County. In full bloom the plants here make a carpet of blue.
Enlow Fork, State Game Land #302, border of Greene and Washington Counties. For a beautiful description of the wonders of Enlow Fork, read this 2005 blog post by Marcia Bonta. Join the annual Enlow Fork Wildflower Walk (and birding!) on Sunday May 1, 2016.

(photos by Donna Foyle)

Juvenile Female Makes Brief Intrusion at Pitt Nest

April 8, 2016Bird Behavior, PeregrinesKate St. John

Juvenile female bows to Terzo at Pitt peregrine nest, 8 April 2016, 3:13pm (photo from National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh)

This afternoon webcam viewers were surprised to see a brown-colored falcon arrive at the Pitt peregrine nest and then bow and e-chup at Terzo as he was incubating.

Terzo was surprised, too. He got up off the eggs and flew away leaving this juvenile, unbanded female to pause for a heartbeat … and then fly away as well.

Click here for the archived footage: Juvenile female visits the nest.

Juvenile unbanded female at Pitt peregrine nest, pausing before she leaves (photo from National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh)

4 minutes later Terzo returned to the eggs.

40 minutes later Hope returned to incubate.

I’ve not had time to review all the footage but so far the archives show no sights or sounds of a fight with Hope. Apparently Hope chased off this juvenile intruder.

For now, all is calm.

p.s. Thanks to Zack and sheba50 for pointing out this brief intrusion. It was so brief that at first I couldn’t find any evidence of it. I had to review a lot of footage to find it!

(photos from the National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh)

Great Blue Heron Courtship

April 8, 2016Nesting & Courtship, Water and ShoreKate St. John

Let’s take a break from birds of prey. Here’s a story about another species.

Great blue herons (Ardea herodias) are returning to Pennsylvania and gathering at their rookeries to court and nest.

This video from Florida shows their elegant gestures and courtship rituals as they build their pair bond.

An added bonus on the video are the bird sounds in the background. Listen and you’ll hear sandhill cranes, boat-tailed grackles and American coots.

(video by Filming Florida on YouTube)

Red-tails Close to Us

April 7, 2016Birds of PreyKate St. John

Red-tailed hawk takes off (photo by Bill Barron) — Red-tailed hawk takes off from Bill’s chimney (photo by Bill Barron)

Red-tailed hawks who live in the city are habituated to people. They go about their business hunting squirrels and eating pigeons — even on the ground — while we walk by or stand and gawk.

This spring a pair of red-tailed hawks is building a nest on Pitt’s campus. They experimented with a tree on the Cathedral of Learning lawn but by Tuesday it was clear they’d chosen the top of a large London plane tree next to the Student Union.

It’ll be interesting to see what happens next.

Will the hawks ultimately use this nest? Will Pitt’s peregrines forbid them from gaining altitude so close to the Cathedral of Learning? (I’ve already seen Terzo hammer one of the hawks.) Will people notice the nest at all?

If the nest was close to the ground, the red-tails would become nervous about us walking below it and might threaten us to chase us away. This rarely happens but it’s memorable, as in this incident at Fenway Park eight years ago –> Red-tails Close to Home.

The red-tail nest on Pitt’s campus is way too high up for that. The hawks and the peregrines will have to work out their boundaries but we ground-based humans are of little interest to them.

And that’s as it should be.

(photo by Bill Barron)

Who is Who at the Pitt Peregrine Nest, April 2016

April 6, 2016PeregrinesKate St. John

Comparison: Terzo and Hope, faces and malar stripes, Spring 2016

6 April 2016:

Now that we’ve had a complete changeover of adult peregrines at the Cathedral of Learning (as of 6 April 2016) we need new guidelines for telling apart the male and female.

Here are some clues for identifying Terzo and Hope when viewing them on the nestcam. The most reliable clues are listed first.

1. Faces: Examine the photos above for these clues. Terzo is at top, Hope on bottom.

Terzo: The area between Terzo’s malar stripe (moustache) and the dark gray of his nape (back of his neck) is bright white with a small black spot at the top. His “necklace” is long and thin and almost reaches the bottom of his malar stripe. Some people say the white area framed by gray looks like a heart.

Hope: The area between Hope’s malar stripe and nape is “muddy” with gray feathers. She has almost no “necklace.”

2. Band colors: Terzo’s color band is Black over Red, N/29. Hope’s is Black over Green, 69/Z.

Terzo's Black/Red band; Hope's Black/Green band — Terzo’s Black/Red band; Hope’s Black/Green band

3. Plumage contrast on back: Adult male peregrines usually have paler gray backs than the females. See the photos below: Terzo on top, Hope at bottom.

Terzo: His head and wingtips are darker than the feathers on his back.

Hope: Her feathers are more uniform in color.

Comparison: Terzo's back is paler than his wingtips (above). Hope is all one color (below) — Comparison: Terzo’s back is paler than his wingtips (above). Hope is all one color (below)

4. Pale Stripes on flanks and legs versus Bold Stripes:

Terzo is a bright white bird and this shows on his legs and flanks. His striped feathers are more white than black.

Hope’s dark stripes are much more obvious.

Comparison: Terzo and Hope, each on the green perch, Spring 2016

And now, a quiz. Can you figure out who is who in this photo? Who’s at the back? Who’s in front? What clues did you use?

Two peregrines at the Cathedral of Learning nest. Who is in the back? Who's in front? (photo from the National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh) — Two peregrines at the Cathedral of Learning nest, 3 April 2016. Who’s in the back? Who’s in front? (photo from the National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh)

(photos from the National Aviary falconcam at Univ of Pittsburgh)

What’s Outdoors in Early April?

April 5, 2016PhenologyKate St. John

Yellow-throated warbler (photo by Chuck Tague)

Spring started early but this week’s cold snap has put everything on “Pause.” From 22 degrees above normal on March 31 to 7 degrees below normal on April 3, we’ve seen it all.

Despite that, this phenology of What to Look For in Early April should be a good one.

How much of the list did you see in March?

So much is yet to come!

p.s. Friends of mine saw yellow-throated warblers (pictured above) last weekend in Morrow-Pontefract Park, Edgeworth.

(photo of a yellow-throated warbler by Chuck Tague)

Schenley Owl Nest Found

April 4, 2016Birds of Prey, Nesting & Courtship, Schenley ParkKate St. John

Great horned owl adult and one owlet, 2 Apr 2016, Anderson Bridge, Schenley Park (photo by Kate St. John)

(If you subscribe to PABIRDS you saw this news over the weekend.)

After the great horned owl fledgling was rescued in Schenley Park on Tuesday March 29 and an adult was seen nearby on Thursday morning, I made it my mission to find the nest. At first I came up empty. There were no big stick nests in any of the hillside trees.

Then, late Friday afternoon I took another look at the underside of the Anderson Bridge.

Faintly through the trees I saw two owlets walking on a girder!

On Saturday I brought my scope and discovered that the “branching” owlets and their mother were quite visible from the Junction Hollow Bike Trail below the bridge. Here are two (lousy!) photographs I took through my scope.

Above, mother owl and one owlet pose on the girder. Below, the second owlet is perched just below the nest. Later he flew from girder to girder and landed near his mother. The blue box highlights him in the washed-out photo.

Second owlet at Anderson Bridge great horned owl nest, Schenley Park,2 Apr 2016 (photo by Kate St. John) — Second owlet at Anderson Bridge great horned owl nest, Schenley Park, 2 Apr 2016 (photo by Kate St. John)

On Sunday I visited the trail again and Nathan Mallory used my scope to take this photo of the two owlets sleeping. You can see their stick nest above them on the lattice.

Two great horned owlets sleeping near their nest under the Anderson Bridge (photo by Nathan Mallory) — Two great horned owlets sleeping near their nest under the Anderson Bridge, 3 Apr 2016 (photo by Nathan Mallory)

So there were three owlets in this nest. The first is in rehab. The other two will probably fly soon.

p.s. As you can see, the Anderson Bridge is very rusty! It will be completely replaced in a few years, after the Greenfield Bridge is done.

(photos by Kate St. John and Nathan Mallory)

Outside My Window

A Blog of Birds & Nature with Kate St. John