The Birders Report

Anna’s Hummingbird (Calypte anna) photos by Larry Jordan

Every year around this time, I begin to see an influx of Anna’s Hummngbirds (Calypte anna). I keep a few feeders up all year because I always have at least one or two hummers that seem to stay year round. Click on photos  for full sized images.

I had been hearing and seeing the Anna’s Hummingbird male performing his famous “dive display” so I put out the nesting material which, I believe, is simply raw cotton.

I was out doing yard work when my wife informed me from the back porch, “hey there’s a hummingbird building a nest.”

The female builds the nest by alternating between plant down gathered on 3–4 successive trips and spider webs collected on 2 trips. The sides and rim develop as she sits in the nest, pushing nest material with her breast while turning frequently. Building begins in early morning and continues actively until late morning, then slows to a stop in midafternoon, but sometimes continues all day, depending somewhat on the weather¹.

The inner cup is lined loosely with downy material (plant, feathers, hair). Walls are made of downy material including cattail, willow, underside of sycamore leaves, thistle, eucalyptus flowers, and small feathers. Binding materials are mostly spider webs and insect cocoon fibers, but also fibrous plant material and rodent hairs. Usually ornamented on the outside with bits of lichens, mosses, and dead leaves; occasionally bark, algae or other plant materials¹.

This is a photo from Nina over at Nature Remains of a Ruby-throated Hummingbird nest. You can see her journal following this nesting hummer here.

I shot a short video of the Anna’s Hummingbirds gathering the nest material from my back porch. I also want to add this disclaimer that the lights you see on my back porch are not left up from Christmas time, they are actually the lights we use on the porch at night rather than white lights 😉

If you want to watch an Allen’s Hummingbird web cam, it’s really cool and you can see it here. If you want to see lots more cool bird photos, check out World Bird Wednesday!

References: ¹Birds of North America Online

If built, the Keystone XL Pipeline would transport dirty tar-sands oil across six states and hundreds of water bodies, making any spill an unacceptable risk. An existing pipeline called Keystone 1 has already leaked 14 times since it started operating in June 2010, including a 21,000-gallon spill. Another tar-sands pipeline dumped 800,000 gallons of tar-sands crude into the Kalamazoo River.

When President Obama announced he would reject the pipeline in January 2012, we cheered a victory for our air, land, water, and endangered animals and plants — but we knew the war over Keystone wasn’t over.

Sure enough, on Feb. 7, 2012, the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee approved legislation that would force the issuance of a permit to construct the Keystone XL pipeline within 30 days, reversing the president’s rejection.

Neither the pipeline nor its proponents, TransCanada, has disappeared. Congressional Republicans, backed by the oil industry, are claiming that Obama’s rejection of Keystone XL would cost tens of thousands of jobs. In reality, though, according to the State Department, Keystone XL would result in just an estimated 20 permanent, operational jobs in the United States and 2,500 to 4,650 temporary jobs.

The Center for Biological Diversity has been leading the legal opposition to this pipeline. Please support the Center for Biological Diversity and take action by telling the rest of the Senate to stand up to oil-industry pressure and oppose this dangerous legislation.

And now it gets even worse. The National Wildlife Federation released a report stating that because the expanding oil and gas production is contributing to the decline of caribou herds in Alberta due to habitat loss from tar sands development, Canada proposes to kill the wolves that prey on the caribou! Incredibly, Canada’s proposed solution to habitat destruction from tar sands development is to destroy the wolves that prey on caribou, instead of protecting their habitat. Is there no end to this insanity?

If you are interested in protecting the lands, waters and climate that species need to survive, including the human species, you may be interested in the League of Conservation Voters (LCV). The LCV is a national non-profit organization that works to turn environmental values into national priorities. Take a look at their 2011 National Environmental Scorecard to see which elected officials are pro-environment and which are not. You can read the full press release here.

California Condor (Gymnogyps californianus) photo by Phil Armitage (Wikipedia)

Here is another no-brainer for you. A new study authored by San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research scientists has found that 67 percent of adult condor deaths are attributable to lead poisoning!

The massive effort to save the California Condor (Gymnogyps californianus) was initiated in 1982 when the remaining 22 wild birds were captured in a last-ditch effort to save the species. Of the 390 condors that exist today, 210 are in the wild, with 118 in California, 73 in Arizona and 19 in Mexico.

The American Bird Conservancy has analyzed almost 500, mostly peer-reviewed studies, and determined that the source of the vast majority of lead poisoning of birds and other wildlife is lead ammunition from hunting.

Darin Schroeder, Vice-President for Conservation Advocacy for American Bird Conservancy said, “Here we have another peer-reviewed study with independent scientists confirming that lead is needlessly and tragically killing protected wildlife. While the nation has removed the lead from paint, gasoline, children’s toys, water pipes, and even car wheel weights, we are still using toxic ammunition. Acceptable lead-free alternatives exist, and we need every hunter in America to make the switch to save the lives of countless non-game birds.”

Co-author of the study, Joseph Brandt, supervisory biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Ventura said, “Here again, we are at another crossroads. We have a (wild) population established, and now we need to face down or correct the threats that we see the population being exposed to.”

Brandt didn’t know how much money has been spent on condor recovery efforts since the start, but he said investment by the federal government and its partners today tops $1 million annually.

Why can’t we ban lead ammunition in America? I mean, really? Is this a no-brainer or what?

We have spent the last 30 years trying to save the California Condor from extinction and doing a pretty damn good job of it, but we can’t get politicians to pass laws banning a poisonous ammunition that is not only killing condors but countless other species as well?

Here are a few related stories:

EPA says no to lead ammo ban

Senators Battle Environmentalists Seeking to Ban Lead in Ammunition

EPA Surrenders to NRA on Gun Control Issue

If you want to know which congressmen get the most kickback from the gun industry, check this out.