Well, the cat’s finally out of the bag: I’m going to be a columnist for WildBird. Editor Amy Hooper recruited me to take over the backyard birding beat covered most recently by Val Cunningham of Minnesota, who stepped in to fill the (figuratively) gigantic shoes of the late Texas birder and naturalist June Osborne. These ladies will be very hard acts to follow.

Though I’ve been a quasi-regular contributor to WB for quite a while now, mainly in the annual hummingbird issue, this new gig will give me opportunities to tackle topics I’ve never been asked to write about before. I’m also looking forward to honoring June’s legacy by bringing a touch of southwestern color back to WB’s coverage of backyard birding.

My new column will debut in the March/April issue. WildBird is available on newsstands, but a subscription will give you more money and time to spend on enjoying birds. And need I mention that WildBird also makes a great any-occasion gift for the bird lovers in your life?

*facepalm*
Originally uploaded to Flickr by
Leo Reynolds

When you think it can’t get any worse, along comes:

AllSands: End Hummingbird Poisoning And Feeder Mess

Some particularly facepalm-worthy excerpts, now with comments:

Red, plastic, hanging, “Hummingbird Feeders” in our backyards are a way to attract hummingbirds; but they are a mistake!

Excessive commas, inappropriate semicolon, unnecessary quotation marks, and Winnie-the-Pooh Capitalization—a very poor start indeed.

Then there is the time consuming process of making the right mix of boiled water and scoops of sugar to duplicate local “flower nectar” to attract the most native hummingbirds to your feeder.

The “right mix” of sugar and water is exactly the same everywhere: 1 part white sugar, 3 to 5 parts water, combine and stir until dissolved. Boiling is unnecessary, though the sugar will dissolve more quickly if the solution is briefly microwaved or brought to a boil on the stove top. If it takes more than 10 minutes, even starting with cold water, you’re overdoing it.

What’s with “the most native hummingbirds”? Is the author trying to imply that some hummingbirds are more native than others, or that if you get the recipe wrong you might attract (presumably undesirable) non-native hummingbirds?

Add the unnecessary quotation marks and missing hyphen where one is actually needed (see below), and you’ve got fractal fail. With all that time saved by not making sugar water, perhaps the anonymous author will find time to read a book on hummingbirds. Or remedial English.

It is not that uncommon to see Hum-birds literally drop out of the sky – when they run out of fuel. If the fall doesn’t break anything critical, one can usually nurse them back to health with a nose drops of warm sugar water within 8 hours; but they’ll die within hours – if poisoned by a filthy Feeder.

Yes, it is extremely uncommon to see one “drop out of the sky.” No, they don’t “die within hours” from dirty feeders. Where did the author dig up this garbage?

“Hum-birds,” “a nose drops,” inappropriate hyphens, more W-t-P Caps, and tortured sentence structure are giving me a headache.

Their wings rotate 180 degrees, like a helicopter…

Since helicopters’ rotors rotate 360 degrees, I’d say the author has stretched this common analogy past the breaking point.

Since most of their energy comes from flower blossom’s nectar, their relatively short lives (3-5 years) are spent like farm workers following the annual flowering schedule over 500 miles from where you are to Mexico – during the winter.

Their lives are relatively long for such small creatures. In the best-known hummingbird species, average life span is 3 to 5 years, but maximum documented ages range from 8 to 12 years. This exceeds the documented longevity of many larger birds and small mammals.

Most of the world’s hummingbirds don’t migrate. Not all hummingbirds that breed north of Mexico go south to Mexico and/or Central America for the winter, and most of those that do have to travel more than 1000 miles to reach safe winter havens.

Was the article originally written for a regional audience who were all assumed to be more than (or is it exactly?) 500 miles from Mexico and/or the wintering grounds of some species of hummingbird?

Confused sentence structure compounded by redundancy (flower = blossom), an incorrect and unnecessary possessive, and another useless hyphen.

Joe Hummingbird has to nest in North America – where nesting spots are less crowded than in Mexico during the summer. So to successfully mate, he has to be the first one in your neighborhood to find the best nesting spots to attract a “soul mate”.

What species is “Joe” anyway?

Mexico is in North America (even though field guide publishers like to pretend it isn’t).

“Joe” doesn’t nest (male hummingbirds are deadbeat dads), and he doesn’t have to be the first to establish a territory to have mating opportunities.

Since when does “soul mate” apply to the avian equivalent of a one-night stand?

Extra fail points for bad punctuation, but the split infinitive gets a pass.

However, if Joe arrives in your neighborhood before the flowers bloom he’ll perish before mating.

No, he won’t. Early-migrating hummingbirds can survive by stealing sweet, nutritious sap from sapsucker wells.

Anyway, Nature has given Joe the uncanny ability to memorize “Territorial” maps; according to a recent study by University of Arizona researcher Dr. William Calder.

The late William A. Calder III, one of the world’s foremost hummingbird experts, studied many aspects of hummingbird biology and behavior, but nothing that could be described as “territorial maps” (whatever that means).

When Joe arrives in your neighborhood and he finds that perfect “love nest”; he’ll perch in a near by tree around a Hummingbird Feeder or sugar-rich flower garden. Joe will literally defend this ideal spot with his life. However, Joe will drain all the nectar-rich flowers surrounding his territory – morning and evening – to keep all other males moving on to find another good food source! This “Sugar-Dry Zone” helps Joe keep other males out of his perfect spot below his perch and within eye surveillance!

Hummingbirds don’t fight to the death, at least not intentionally. Dead hummingbirds can’t mate, and that’s the whole point of this kind of territoriality.

“Sugar-Dry Zone”??

Extra fail points for misspelling, inappropriate semicolon, more W-t-P Caps, “love nest,” and “eye surveillance.”

There’s more, but I can’t bear to go on. On the positive side, at least the writer got the part about red dye right. We can only hope he/she doesn’t get a book contract, because the world has more than enough bad books on hummingbirds.

A modern haiku inspired by yesterday’s Hummingbird Field Clinic:

Summer sun reveals
dark continents adrift in
seas of boiling lava

From the Lindsay Post (emphasis added):

Also included in the list is the Bee Hummingbird, which measures two inches long and weighs half an ounce making it the world’s smallest bird.

Field Sparrows and Violet-green Swallows weigh around a half ounce, which is 14.17 grams. At about 1.8 grams each, it would take almost eight Bee Hummingbirds to weigh half an ounce.

But seriously, I’m troubled that this article was written, and presumably researched, by the Chief Librarian at the City of Kawartha Lakes Public Library. This was the most conspicuous error, but several other statements betray the author’s inadequate research into birds and birding. On the plus side, the article recommends A Supremely Bad Idea: Three Mad Birders and Their Quest to See It All and The Young Birder’s Guide to Birds of Eastern North America.

from an original photo by Juan Tello, licensed by Creative Commons

Woo hoo! I’ve just learned that my recent post “Do we see what bees see?” has been selected as one of 50 winners (out of >500 entries over 800 entries) for The Open Laboratory: The Best Writing on Science Blogs 2008. It’s so exciting to see Life, Birds, and Everything right up there with some big names in the science blogosphere, including some of my regular reads such as fellow bird blogger GrrlScientist. The anthology will be available shortly as both a book and a download from Lulu.com.

The illustration above (from a photo by Juan Tello, Creative Commons) serves double duty, because this year my dear husband Tom presented me with my second favorite gift of my adult life: chickens. Okay, I didn’t actually get the chickens, but Tom’s donation to Heifer International in my honor will make it possible for rural residents in Central America to receive chicks to start their own flocks. I love chickens, and Tom said maybe someday we’ll get some of our own, but in the meantime this is a gift I can feel good about and won’t have to feed and clean up after. (My favorite gift? An acre of tropical forest in Belize that Tom adopted in my honor.)


Created by OnePlusYou

Well, it’s official: At the end of the month I’ll be joining fellow contributors to Good Birders Don’t Wear White at Cape May Bird Observatory’s Autumn Weekend and The Bird Show. Can’t wait to see old friends and enjoy the wonders of migration in one of North America’s premiere hot spots. Now, to find a karaoke venue…