Ciblek Mania

It's been an incredible year of bird watching. As I think back on some of the sweet birds I've seen—some of them lifers, some just old favorites—I find it nearly impossible to pick just one as my BOY—my Bird of the Year. Here are some of the nominees: Above is the lesser prairie chicken I got to see, with dozens of his fellow lekkers, outside of Woodward, Oklahoma, during the Lesser Prairie Chicken Festival. What a soul-stirring morning spent in a small blind, waiting for enough of the dawn to coalesce so I could see these incredible birds perform their ancient courtship ritual.

An even rarer life bird came to me (really I went questing after it) in central Texas in late June. The male golden-cheeked warbler that I found at Friedrich Wilderness Park north of San Antonio was my next-to-last U.S.-breeding warbler species (only the hard-to-see Colima warbler remains unchecked on my life list).

Actually the first golden-cheeked individual I saw was a begging fledgling, which looked a whole lot like an adult bird only rattier and fluffier of plumage. When the adult male came in, followed by the adult female, and the three of them dropped down to drink and bathe in a small pool 20 feet away, my identification was confirmed. And I began to suppress a scream of joy. It was a extra poignant to see a fledgling of this federally endangered species—and to think of how few fledgling golden-cheeked warblers there were in the world at that moment.

I'm often asked, as most birders are, to share which species is my favorite bird. Since my pre-teen years, my answer has been red-headed woodpecker. I'm not sure why, but this bird just gets me fired up. Perhaps because this is a bird of contradictions. They are increasingly rare here in southeastern Ohio, but they were common in the southeastern Iowa of my childhood. They are ID-able from a great distance in flight flashing the semaphore of white and black wings, yet they often go unnoticed as they perch quietly. Some red-headeds migrate, others don't. Where they are common they are reliable to see, but they can also show up just about anywhere, especially in fall migration. They are often confused with the much more common red-bellied woodpecker and species that has, at best, a red Mohawk stripe of red. And the red on the red-headed's head (say THAT 10 times fast)—well it's perhaps the most compelling red on any bird. Yep, it's my fave. This year we heard about a nesting colony of RHWOs about an hour away from home in West Virginia, so we took several trips there to commune with them.


While traversing the New River Gorge Bridge on the catwalk below the road surface, I got to enjoy my closest-ever look at an adult peregrine falcon. The above photo was taken with my Canon G12 point-and-shoot camera. This bird was CLOSE! The bird of prey highlight of the year for me.

The local birding grapevine whispered in my ear about a possible sandhill crane in our county. I was initially doubtful because we have an exploding population of great blue herons in the region. Sure enough, at dusk the same day I first heard about the crane, we found it. Foraging in a field of newly sprouted sweet corn. It stayed around long enough for me to get several birding friends out to see it. My first-ever Ohio sandhill crane and, if I kept a Washington County, Ohio bird list this would be a nice addition to it!

These are just four of the nominees for my BOY. I'll do my best to share the rest during the holidays, before the list stats anew at 12:01 am on 1/1/12.

Did the title of this post make you wonder for a moment? I hope so. Sounds pretty weird, doesn't it? But it's true. Let me explain.



Out on the wide-open expanses of the Oklahoma prairie (and in a few nearby states) the lesser prairie chicken is holding onto its existence, barely. But the species' population is a fraction of what it once was. Prairie chickens were once so abundant that they fed pioneer families for entire seasons. Market hunters shot them until the hunters' arms were too sore to shoot anymore. And over the last two centuries, the species has decline significantly from hunting pressure, but more recently as a result of habitat loss and habitat alteration.



Native short-grass prairie is the specific habitat that the lesser prairie chicken prefers. Plow it up for wheat or soybeans or any other crop and the chickens have to go elsewhere. When trees naturally seed and grow up tall enough to cast a shadow, the chickens, feeling the trees might be ideal for a perching or hiding predator, go elsewhere. Plop down an oil derrick or a line of wind turbines—same result: move along LPCs.



All of these factors have contributed to the decline of this very special prairie species. But lurking just above ground level was another culprit in the lesser prairie chicken's decimation: barbed wire. Researchers in the field had discovered what farm hands and ranchers had known for a long time: prairie chickens often fly just above ground level, and because they often fly in to lekking grounds well before daylight, this flying style made them especially prone to colliding with barbed wire fence. The fence is essentially invisible in low light: rusty wire against sere-brown grass.



That's where the vinyl siding comes in. Field researchers looking for a way to reduce fence-chicken collisions landed on a seemingly ingenious solution. Small, three-to-four-inch sections of vinyl siding, with its interlocking channels, snapped perfectly into place on strands of barbed wire. The white hunks of hard vinyl fluttered slightly in the prairie wind, but held fast to the wire. Unlike pieces of white flagging, the vinyl siding lasted through the intense hot and cold and high winds of the Oklahoma seasons. Best, though, they made the wire fence strands visible to flying lesser prairie chickens, even in low light conditions.



My reason for being in Oklahoma was to deliver a keynote talk to the Lesser Prairie Chicken Festival in Woodward, Oklahoma. This festival offers the expected field trips to temporary viewing blinds set up adjacent to known display leks so attendees can see the chickens in action. Since the LPC was a life bird for me, I was excited to make the trip to Woodward. But the festival also offers something that I found to be even more meaningful—a chance to do something to actually help the lesser prairie chicken: by placing strips of vinyl siding on barbed wire fences in habitat adjacent to known lesser prairie chicken habitat.



One of the prairie chicken experts I got to meet in Oklahoma was Dr. Dwayne Elmore (above). He knew the location of most of the active LPC leks in the area.





We met a guy from the Oklahoma Department of Natural Resources who selected a section of fence for us to mark. He demonstrated how to mark the fence for the chickens, pointed to several large burlap sacks of cut-up vinyl siding, then pointed to a long stretch of as yet unmarked barbed-wire (locals call it "bobwire") fence.





We set to work.

The idea was to stagger the siding pieces every two feet or so on the top two strands of wire. This seems to be the most effective use of this collision deterrent, since it's right at the height at which LPCs do much of their flying at dawn and dusk.



Here's a piece of vinyl siding snapped into place. The channels in the siding are just the right size to snap down over a strand of wire, between the barbs/bobs.





As you can see, the white siding pieces present a visual image that's easy to notice.



After the fence was marked and we ran out of siding pieces, we felt a real sense of accomplishment. Here's hoping the fence-marking program results in greatly lower mortality from fence strikes, which could in turn mean more chickens dancing on the prairie.



I've got at least a couple more posts in mind about this wonderful part of the world and the great birds and people there. I'll try to get back for a BOTB visit to the big wide open of Oklahoma sometime soon.

This adult male lesser prairie chicken spent our morning together dancing in his lek on the Selman Ranch, near Buffalo, Oklahoma.

I didn't want you to think I didn't get any good photos! I'll tell the whole story in the days ahead.

In my dreams I have seen you there, dancing.
Dew-kissed little bluestem your stage set.
Grunting bison and whistling meadowlarks your only audience, save for me.

Many's the time I thought to come find you, but life snatched my plans from me as the prairie wind tugs at my words. Getting to the middle of nowhere requires more than good intentions.

Now sitting hunkered down, as if to imitate your own pre-dance posture, I wait, breathless, for your show to begin. I hear you hoot and whinny, gurgle and cluck. I am beside myself with anticipation.
All of us are waiting for the sun to tell us when this show can begin. As it has for thousands of years, the sun rules this natural phenomenon. No one will blink the house lights to alert us. We must be here, poised, prepared to leap and court. Or in my case, prepared to gasp with utter amazement.

I'd like to thank you gentlemen for letting me watch your prairie ballet. And, lest we forget, thanks also to the ladies for making these dudes dance.

Those rather poor photos represent my two latest life birds: the black-capped vireo and the lesser prairie chicken. I got both of them while attending The Woodward Lesser Prairie Chicken Festival in Woodward, Oklahoma. This small-sized birding fest is a keeper. And the birds are stupid ossum.

I'm going back for better chicken photos tomorrow, if the weather gods comply. Got great looks at both species, though, and that counts most of all for me. Just love being out here in the land of the big sky—it does one's heart some good.