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Backyard bird feeding is one of the most enjoyable and rewarding hobbies on earth. Join Cheryl and Kiersten as they talk all about bird feeding in the desert Southwest area of the United States. They talk birds, seed, feeders, and dealing with those pesky unwanted visitors!
Episodes
Monday Jul 17, 2023
Monday Jul 17, 2023
July is Window Strike Awareness month, so we thought we'd repost this episode from 2021 about how we can prevent window strike deaths.
Summary:Window strikes are scary for us and can be deadly for birds. Cheryl and Kiersten shed some light on why it happens and how we can prevent it.
Show Notes: https://abcbirds.org
www.thezoologicalworld.com/how-birds-see/
Background bird song: Naturescapes Backyard Birdswww.naturescapes.com
Our New email address, please reach out with comments, questions, or suggestions: thefeathereddesert@gmail.com
We are no longer sponsored by Wild Birds Unlimited, Mesa but through personal experience we highly recommend their products.
Saturday Jul 15, 2023
Saturday Jul 15, 2023
Summary: Welcome to Plant Spotlight, a three-minute podcast brought to you by The Feathered Desert all about native plants of the southwestern desert.
This week we're talking about the Desert Willow!
Monday Jul 10, 2023
Monday Jul 10, 2023
Summary: Learning to bird by ear is an important part of becoming an expert birder. Join Cheryl and Kiersten as they discuss four more southwest birds and play their songs and calls.
For our hearing impaired listeners, a transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.
Show Notes:
iBird Ultimate app
Song provided by Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, House Finch recorded by Ryan O’Donnell, House Sparrow recorded by Pat Goltz, Phainopepla recorded by Paul Suchanek, Pyrruhuloxia recorded by James McNamara, and Spotted Towhee recorded by Paul Marvin.
Transcript
Birding by Ear in the Southwest Part 5
Kiersten: Intro – Welcome everyone. This week we are continuing our birding by ear series. We’ll discuss another five species, how to identify them by sight and more importantly how to identify them by sound. This is an interactive episode so take a moment to grab your bird ID guide so you can pair a picture of the bird while we play their song. Pairing the image with the sound will help imprint the information into your memory. Cheryl and I both believe this is an underappreciated but very important part of birding, so listen up!
Cheryl: House Finch
We’re going to start off with a common bird that many of you have seen and probably have heard but may not have realized it. The House finch is a medium-sized, widespread finch that is a year-round resident of the southwest. House finches have brown-streaked backs, wings and brown-streaked and white underparts. The male will have a reddish-pink head, throat, and rump. During breeding season, the males will be very bright red. Females lack the red coloration but do have the brown steaking over their entire chest and back with a brown head. The beak is small and gray and made for cracking open seeds and picking berries. The tail is longish and has a very slight notch.
The coloration of the male house finch is influenced by diet. The more nutritious the diet the redder the color of feathers. The color can vary from red to yellow based on the food available during molting. The red color is important for catching a female because a female wants a strong male to contribute his DNA to her young and to help her raise the chicks. If you are a bright red male, it means you are capable of finding and fighting for good quality food and are a healthy adult; therefore, you are more attractive to the ladies.
House finches are found all over the United States, southern Canada, and all of Mexico. They can be found in almost every type of habitat, but in the West, they prefer chaparral, desert, orchards, and suburban areas. Originally, they were a western bird, but in 1940 a small population was transported to Long Island, New York where they were released and flourished.
House finches are common bird feeder visitors so most likely you have seen them. Next time you see this pretty bird listen for this song ____ and you’ll be able to recognize them by ear.
Kiersten: House Sparrow
The next medium-sized bird is also common all across the United States and is often seen in cities. You’ve probably seen the House Sparrow at your local hardware store or grocery store hanging in the parking lot searching for food scraps and nesting in the signs above the doors.
This urban bird is actually quite handsome. Both sexes have light gray underparts and chest. The males have a black throat and upper breast with black around the eye. They have a charcoal gray cap on the head with a chestnut brown nape on the back of the head. They have lighter gray cheeks and brown and black wings. The handsome black and brown head coloration will fade in winter.
Females are a bit darker gray on the chest and underparts, some may even look brown. They have brown and black wings with a brown head. They have a thick cream-colored eye stripe that helps you differentiate between a female house sparrow and a female house finch. They have a thicker heavier beak than the house finch. The male’s beak with be black during breeding season and yellow in winter. Females are yellow all year.
This sparrow is found all over the world. They are native to Europe but were introduced to the rest of the world except Antarctica. They are found in cities, towns, and agricultural areas. They are omnivores eating grains, fruits, and insects, but they especially like grains and will eat both wild and domestic seeds.
Their song and chatter are background noise to our lives that we all probably take for granted. When you hear this ____ take a moment to look around for this sparrow.
Many people, especially in the US, see this bird as a pest because they were introduced to our continent and take resources from our native species. We need to remember though we made that decision for these birds and they have adapted to the environment we brought them into. Next time you see this little bird think about how they are seen in Japan and maybe you’ll see them in a slightly different light. Sparrows, including the house sparrow, are traditionally a symbol of loyalty because of their social nature and their ability to get along in large groups. (Maybe we can learn a little something from their behavior!)
These birds actually return to their birthplace after every migration. Since they visit the same place every year, they want to make sure they blend in well. Because of this characteristic, called philopatric behavior, they have developed fourteen distinct population colors in the West. So, there are 14 individual House sparrow subspecies in the western world.
Cheryl: Phainopepla
The phainopepla is a striking bird found only in the southwestern United States and Mexico. It is a medium-sized songbird with a slim body, head crest, long tail and bright red eyes. The male is all black while the female is a slate gray. When the male is in flight large white wing patches can be seen on the tops of the wings. Locally, people often refer to the phainopepla as the black cardinal, but it’s not a cardinal and it’s not even in the same family as the cardinal.
These amazing birds are fond of washes and riparian areas with arid scrubs. They eat insects that they catch on the wing and mistletoe berries. Most animals cannot eat these berries because they are poisonous but phainopepla can eat 1,100 berries a day when they are in season.
Speaking of mistletoe, this is a great way to look for phainopepla because they nest in mistletoe bunches during breeding season. They take advantage of the berries being readily available and they also eat the spiders that live in the mistletoe, as well. Unlike most songbirds, the phainopepla breeds twice a year. And even more unusual they do so in two different nesting sites.
Their song is quiet, and you really need to listen closely to detect these birds by ear. (Insert song) If you hear this take a moment to look around and find this supercool bird. The phainopepla does have its own song and calls, but when they are pursued by predators or handled by humans, they may mimic the calls of other birds. Imitations of 13 different species have been recorded. We don’t yet know why they do this, but it is interesting.
Kiersten: Pyrrhuloxia
First things first with this next bird, how do we say the name? Pyrrhuloxia is actually on the National Audubon Society’s list of 17 tricky names of North American bird. It is pronounced peer-uh-LOX-ee-a. I’ve heard it pronounced peer-oo-LEE-a, but apparently you do pronounce the X.
The pyrrhuloxia is a medium-sized songbird that is often mistaken for a cardinal that is having a bad molting year, but they are separate birds. Unlike the phainopepla, they are related but they are separate species. The pyrrhuloxia is predominantly gray with red splashes on the crest, around the eyes and beak, down the chest, on the edge of the wings, and outer edges of the tail. Females are gray but with less red. What really sets them apart from cardinals is their beak. The beak is bright yellow and is deeper at the base than a cardinal’s with a downward curve.
The pyrrhuloxia is found only in the southwest including southern Arizona, New Mexico, western Texas, and Mexico. It can sometimes stray north of these areas but they prefer habitat with thorny thickets and desert brush near streambeds. Their diet consists of flower spikes, fruit, berries, seeds, and insects.
Their calls and songs are usually quite distinctive and can carry a nice distance. Listen for this ____ when you’re in their favored habitat and hopefully you’ll catch a glimpse of this amazing songbird.
Sometimes this bird is called the desert cardinal but we’re sticking with the pyrrhuloxia because we don’t want the confusion that this local name can cause, and pyrrhuloxia makes you sound super smart to other birders!
Cheryl: Spotted Towhee
Our last bird of this episode is the Spotted Towhee.
The spotted towhee is a large sparrow that is predominantly black, white, and reddish brown. Males and females are very similar with the female being slightly duller black. The spotted towhee’s head, back, throat, wings, and tail are black with white spots on the wings and back. The sides are reddish brown and the underbelly is white. The tail is long. Both the male’s and female’s eyes are red.
The spotted towhee is found throughout the western portion of the United States, Canada, and Mexico. They do migrate spending winter in Texas and spring and summer in the north. A large population from New Mexico to California and Oregon are year-round residents. They like forest edges, thickets, gardens, and shrubby park areas.
The calls of the spotted towhee can be variable and recognizing their calls and songs can take some practice, but if you hear this ____ take a moment to look around for this beautiful bird. You’ll want to check out the ground under the bushes because they are often seen scratching up insects and seeds on the ground. They have a double scratch pattern that helps them unearth insects and have been known to munch on a lizard or two.
If you come too close to a nest during nesting season you may see the female running away. She does this to attract predators away from the nest to protect her young. She makes herself vulnerable to being caught by running until she feels the predator is far enough away from the nest and will then take flight to save herself.
Kiersten: Closing – That’s all for this episode of Birding by Ear in the Southwest. Pairing sound and images together is the next step to becoming an expert birder, not to mention it helps keep your brain healthy. So, use your eyes and your ears next time you’re out and about.
Song provided by Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, House Finch recorded by Ryan O’Donnell, House Sparrow recorded by Pat Goltz, Phainopepla recorded by Paul Suchanek, Pyrruhuloxia recorded by James McNamara, and Spotted Towhee recorded by Paul Marvin.
Saturday Jul 08, 2023
Saturday Jul 08, 2023
Summary: Welcome to Plant Spotlight, a three-minute podcast brought to you by The Feathered Desert all about native plants of the southwestern desert.
This week we're talking about Watson's Dutchman's Pipe!
Monday Jul 03, 2023
Monday Jul 03, 2023
Summary: How well can birds remember? Join Cheryl and Kiersten for a short discussion on bird memory. It’s an episode you won’t forget!
For our hearing impaired listeners, a transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.
Show Notes:
https://allaboutbirds.org/brain-power-wins-over-brawn-when-male-hermit-humingbirds
https://audubon.org/magazine/march-april-2016/meet-bird-brainiacs-american-crow
https://learnbirdwatching.com/do-birds-have-a-good-memory
https://theconversation.com/inner-gps-of-bird-brains-may-be-better-than-that-of humans-32648
Our email address, please reach out with comments, questions, or suggestions: thefeathereddesert@gmail.com
Transcript
Cheryl: Intro
When I decided on bird Memory as a topic for this podcast, I really wanted it to be about a bird’s memory. Sometimes, when we are observing a bird’s behavior we think “oh, that is so smart”, or “how did it know to do that?” Our thought process leans towards intelligence of the bird, but sometimes it’s the bird’s ability to remember things and not its smarts that we should be impressed with. Birds and mammals, yes-that includes humans, have what is called a “Hippocampus”.
Kiersten: What is a hippocampus?
Well, hippocampus is a neural structure located in the medial temporal lobe of the brain. It is responsible for the formation and retrieval of memories. Birds possess a hippocampus that senses many of the same spatial and mnemonic functions as the mammalian hippocampus but achieves these outcomes with a dramatically different neuroanatomical organization.
Cheryl:
Studies have found that some types of birds can remember details about their environment for up to two years. Birds have been observed exhibiting signs of recall related behaviors, such as recognizing people or objects from previous encounters.
Songbirds can remember the melodies they heard earlier in life. Recent studies suggest that birds are capable of long-term memory, meaning they can store and recall specific memories over an extended period of time. This is largely due to the fact that their brains contain a region known as ‘song nuclei’ that helps them to store information related to songs and other vocalizations.
Kiersten:
It is clear that birds possess an impressive ability to remember details about their environment over extended periods of time which makes them adept problem solvers. Some birds participate in a behavior known as caching, and it allows birds to store food for later. The birds that cache food need to remember where they have stored their food. Birds that cache have-well developed hippocampus (responsible for spatial memory). Birds that do not need to remember the location of stored food won’t have the same memory power as a bird that does.
So, the question was asked by researchers “Are Black-capped Chickadees smarter in Alaska than their relatives in the lower forty-eight? (Colorado) In 2016, a study was done comparing the caching behavior and memory of Black-Capped Chickadees from Alaska and then from Colorado, as well as the size of their hippocampi (again the brain regions associated with learning and memory) and how many neurons they contained. Thought behind the study was that because Alaska birds experience harsher winters, they would need to be better at caching and recovering food. When the study was over it was clear that the higher the elevation-harsher the winter – the more neurons-dense the bird’s hippocampus was.
Cheryl:
In 2014 the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine was awarded to three neuroscientists for their pioneering work on the brain’s “inner GPS system”. Over the course of four decades, they revealed that a small part in the brain called the hippocampus stores a map of animals’ surroundings and helps them navigate.
The award-winning work was done in mice, but it was shown to be true in seed-caching birds. Seed-caching birds store food in hundreds or even thousands of sites, like the fore-mentioned Chickadees, the Clark Nutcracker is the most remarkable example of this because it displays a striking caching behavior, making more than 5,000 caches of seeds in the autumn and recovering them seven to nine months later in the spring. These birds remember 95-97% of their caches.
This surpasses our own capacity for long-term memory. Other birds may possess longer term memory as well, but none are known to store and retrieve such large amounts of information so accurately. The Clark’s Nutcracker has a much larger hippocampus size than most other species in its genus. Which may be partially responsible for their superior long-term memory. The Clark’s Nutcracker is in the Corvidae family.
Another bird found to have an extra spacious hippocampus is the Brown-head cowbird. The female has a larger hippocampus than the male Brown-headed cowbird. Brown-headed cowbirds do not raise their own young. These birds trick other birds into raising their young for them. So, the female will perform, a meticulous daily examination of various nests before making a decision and returning to the selected one a few days later.
The reason for this is in order for her ruse to work the timing of her egg hatching and of the host eggs hatching have to be in tune. The female cowbird can only lay her eggs in the host’s nests when the host is also laying her own eggs, making the nest briefly available to the cowbird. Nests must therefore be erased from the cowbird’s memory as “potential” targets once they are no longer available, just as seed-caching birds have to discard sites once they have recovered the food stored in it.
Kiersten:
In the case of small but mighty, brains win over brawn when hermit Hummingbirds of Costa Rica compete for a female’s attention. Researchers found that the dominant male Long-billed Hermits have better spatial memories and sing more consistent songs than less successful males. The benefit of a good spatial memory even outweighs the advantage of bigger body size and extra flight power.
The Long-billed Hermit is common in the rainforest of costa Rica. It’s about twice the size of the familiar Anna’s or ruby-throated Hummingbird, with a long, curved bill just right for sipping nectar from brilliant-orange heliconia flowers. Males perch in the forest understory and sing incessantly, every day during their 8-month breeding season, at display sites known as leks. The dominant males fight over coveted singing perches.
Displaying males risk losing their spot each time they leave to refuel, so there’s a premium on getting to nectar-rich flowers quickly. But feeding trips are like giant games of concentration, with each bird often flying for a mile and having to choose among thousands of blooms to get their fill. Males who could remember where the reliable food sources were consistently more likely to be dominant birds with perches at the lek. So, males with good spatial memories did better in the mating market.
The spatial memory could help in two ways- by making foraging trips faster, or by helping the males keep track of where their rivals sat within the lek, making it easier to defend against them. Males with better spatial memory also sang more consistent songs. It’s thought this ability is attractive to females, because it means the singer sounds less like an inexperienced youngster and more like a veteran survivor.
Cheryl: Closing
The more I learn about birds the more I find there is to know. Crows needs only one experience to form a long-lasting memory of who can be trusted and who can’t-essential knowledge when you are dealing with humans who might either feed you or shoot you. We always think we are the smart species—we are the ones with game -changing intelligence, but it’s a matter of degree, and we are more similar to the other species such as birds- then we think.
Thursday Jun 29, 2023
Thursday Jun 29, 2023
Summary:A three-minute podcast from the hosts of The Feathered Desert about individual bird species found in the desert Southwest.
Show Notes:
Bird song provided by Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology recorded by Laurens Halsey.
Monday Jun 26, 2023
Monday Jun 26, 2023
Summary: Our desert areas of Arizona are home to three full time herons. Join Cheryl and Kiersten as they talk about these three fascinating birds and tell you where you can see them.
For our hearing impaired listeners, a transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.
Show Notes:
Personal observations and experiences.
Transcript
Cheryl: Intro
Arizona is known for its’s dry heat, and desert landscapes but, this state has waterways natural, and man -made that have attracted a bird family known for its skilled fishing, and water wading, Herons. Kiersten and I are going to be talking about just three different herons that live Arizona year-round. Our state is host to several other lesser known herons that migrate here in the summer to breed. The first one is one of my favorite birds to watch -the Green Heron.
Kiersten: Green Heron
This small and stocky bird with a dagger-like bill, and a thick neck that is often drawn into their body. Adults have a deep green back and crown, and a chestnut neck and breast. Juveniles are small and compact but they are browner overall, with pale streaking on the neck and spots on the wings with a dark cap.
This small heron usually hunts from shore rather than by wading like other larger herons, so green heron bird is often over looked by some because it is tucked away or hunched on slender yellow legs at the water’s edge, often hidden behind a tangle of leaves. The green heron is well aware of its surroundings and knows when it has been discovered. If you are lucky to have it tolerate your presence then you will see it crouch down patiently to surprise a fish with a snatch and grab of its dagger-like bill.
The green heron is one of the world’s few tool-using bird species. You may learn more on this subject by listening to our Birds and Tools podcast. Green herons often create fishing lures with bread crusts, insects, or feathers by dropping these items on the surface of the water to entice small fish. Occasionally, green herons will dive for deep-water prey and need to swim back to shore.
Green herons are year-round residents in Arizona, and are found along inland wetlands here in Arizona that would be lakes, ponds, riverways and other wet habitats such as golf courses with trees and shrubs to provide secluded nest sites. Green herons eat a variety of small fish, insects, spiders, crustaceans, amphibians, reptiles and small rodents.
When it is time to pair up for breeding season the male selects a secluded site within his territory and starts the nest, but once he finds a mate, the male heron will turn the construction over to the female. The nest is made of long, thin sticks that the female fashions in a home about 12 inches in diameter. Both sexes brood and feed the chicks, which may stay with their parents for more than a month after leaving the nest, as they learn to forage. Green herons are territorial and will defend their nest site.
The overall population of these herons has declined by 51% due to habitat loss and contaminates in wetlands that it thrives in.
Cheryl: Black-crowned Night Heron
Black-crowned Night Heron is a stocky and compact bird that often tucks its neck into its body creating a hunch backed look. Adults have a black cap and back which contrasts with its whitish to pale gray belly and gray wings. Juveniles are brown and streaky overall with a pale yellowish bill.
These birds are most active at night or at dusk giving them a ghostly appearance as they come flapping out from their daytime roosts to forage along the waterways they inhabit.
These are social birds that breed in colonies of stick nests usually built over water. They live along waterways of fresh, salt or brackish wetlands such as streams, rivers lakes, ponds, lagoons, and canals here in Arizona, and are the widespread heron in the world.
Night herons are opportunistic feeders that may eat many kinds of terrestrial, fresh water and marine animals. Their diets consist of leeches, earthworms, insects, crayfish, clams, mussels, fish, amphibians, lizards, snakes, turtles, rodents, birds and eggs. They avoid eating during the day so as not to compete with longer-legged heron species.
When it comes time to start a family, the male chooses a nest site in a tree or in cattails usually in an area safe from predators. Night herons are colony nesters, often dozens nest together in an area.
The male starts building a platform nest out of sticks, twigs and woody vegetation, and when he finds a mate, he will pass the job of nest building to her just like with the green herons. The male and female work together to provide for the family until the fledglings disperse out into the world.
It is surprising that this bird’s population is stable across most of the U.S. since it lives along the waters edge which exposes the bird to contaminates in the water as well as development and draining of its watery habitat. Night herons are tolerant of disturbances such as traffic, and other human activities so they are especially useful for revealing environmental deterioration in urban environments.
Kiersten: Great Blue Heron
This stately heron often stands motionless as it scans for prey or wades belly deep with long deliberate steps. These birds may move slowly, but Great Blue herons can strike like lightning to grab a fish or snap up a gopher. The adults are very large and tall, with a long neck. They are grayish-blue overall with a long orangish-yellow bill. Adults have a black crown and black head plumes. Juveniles are grayish-blue with pale belly, dark streaking on neck, and its bill is long and dusky colored. Despite their size Great Blue Heron adults only weigh about 5-6 pounds. This is in part to their hollow bones- a feature all birds share. Another interesting fact is the Great Blue herons have excellent night vision so no one is safe when it is on the hunt.
These large herons live in both fresh water and salt water habitats, and also forage in grasslands and agricultural fields, where they stalk frogs and small mammals. Here in Arizona, Great Blue Herons may be found along rivers and streams, lakes, canals, golf course ponds, agricultural and irrigation fields. Great Blue herons have benefited from the reintroduction and recovery of the beaver population in North America because of the wetlands these large water engineers create.
In flight, the Great Blue heron folds it’s neck into an “S” shape and trails its long legs behind, dangling them as it prepares to land. When watching this bird fly with its slow, deep wingbeats is like watching a pterodactyl flying out of over a primordial swamp.
Great Blue herons nest mainly in trees, but will also nest on the ground, or on bushes, on mangroves, and on structures such as duck blinds, channel markers, or artificial nest platforms. These large birds are colony nesters like the Black-crowned Night Heron. Nest are generally made out of sticks gathered by the male. The female will line the nest with plant material such as pine needles, moss, reeds, or dry grass. Colonies of Great Blue herons can get quite large with up to 50 or more pairs in an area. These colonies once established can last for over 50 years. Great Blue Herons have elaborate courtship and pair-bonding displays that include ritualized greetings, stick transfers and more.
Because the Great Blue Heron depends on wetlands for feeding and on relatively undisturbed sites for breeding, they are vulnerable to habitat loss and human impacts such as traffic, logging, motorboats, chemical pollutants or other causes of reduced water quality.
Cheryl: Closing
Today Kiersten and shared with interesting facts and descriptions about three amazing shore/wading birds that reside in Arizona. The Great Blue Heron was the first bird that opened me up to the majesty and marvel of the bird world. I was 8 years old, on a very early morning bird walk along the saltwater marshes of the Long Island sound in New York. It was sunrise, there was a mist rising off the water, then out into the open moves this huge bird as tall as I was. I still can see it all these year later.
The Black-crowned Night heron is an intense discovery when you are out birding along the water’s edge. It is rarely flustered by humans so I have many times come across it just as it is about to snag a meal. This bird tolerance for people in its space is one of the reasons its population is more stable than the green heron.
Last but one least, the green heron elusive behavior of skulking among the grasses and reeds as water laps at its feet make it a joyous discovery when spotted. It is reluctant to have an audience so it is rare to get any really time to watch it, but it one of my favorites to look for when I am out birding at the Gilbert Water Ranch. The green heron croaking like call makes it even more of an oddity and worth the search.
Hopefully, this has intrigued some of our listeners if not all to get up and out to water this summer to wade along with these herons who know just where to find the best fish.
Monday Jun 19, 2023
Monday Jun 19, 2023
Summary: Join Cheryl and Kiersten as we celebrate Father's Day by talking about some of the best bird dads!
Show Notes:
Emperor Penguins - earthsky.org
Cassowary - https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2004/12/02/2580070.htm
Emu - https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/emu-parenthood
Ostrich - https://www.natgeokids.com/uk/discover/animals/birds/ostrich-facts/
Rhea - https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Rhea_americana/
https://www.audubon.org/news/five-fathers-day-lessons-really-great-bird-dads
Background bird song: Naturescapes Backyard Birdswww.naturescapes.com
Our New email address, please reach out with comments, questions, or suggestions: thefeathereddesert@gmail.com
We are no longer sponsored by Wild Birds Unlimited, Mesa but through personal experience we highly recommend their products.
Tuesday Jun 13, 2023
Tuesday Jun 13, 2023
Summary: Welcome to Plant Spotlight, a three-minute podcast brought to you by The Feathered Desert all about native plants of the southwestern desert.
For my hearing impaired listeners, a complete transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.
Show Notes:
https://aznps.com/wp-content/uploads/Stinknet-Brochure-English-Feb2020.pdf
https://sdcwma.org/docs/stinknet_desert_plants.pdf
Transcript
(Music plays) Host Voice: Welcome to Plant Spotlight, a three-minute podcast brought to you by The Feathered Desert all about native plants of the southwestern desert.
Kiersten: Welcome to our pilot episode of Plant Spotlight. For those of you that have been listening to The Feathered Desert from the beginning, this title may sound familiar. In some of our first episodes we highlighted native southwest desert plants and we wanted to make this information a little more accessible. Both Cheryl and I believe that planting native plants is how we will save the planet, so this podcast will focus on some of our favorite native plants and some of our most devious non-native invasive plants.
Speaking of which, we are starting off with Stinknet, also known as Globe Chamomile, which is an invasive weed from South Africa. This plant was introduced to the United States in the 1970’s. It grows exceptionally well in our dry climate and is actually quite a handsome plant. It is a dark green with lace like leaves and when it blooms it has pretty little, bright yellow sphere-shaped flowers. It has a musky scent like chamomile when it’s in bloom. Don’t be fooled by this lovely plant though, it spreads like wildfire pushing out important native plants that support our local native insects. And as we all know, insects run the world. It can have twenty or more blooms on each plant and when those blooms dry, the seeds, which can number in the thousands per plant, will blow away into the landscape reseeding itself for the next year.
The last few years stinknet has become a serious problem in the southwest desert. Our late summer rains have encouraged more stinknet to grow. The young plants emerge in February and grow through the spring, going to seed in the summer. Once they dry out, the plants become a serious fire hazard because it has grown between the creosote, the palo verde, and the various cacti of the desert landscape. The desert guards itself against fire by spreading its plants far apart keeping fire localised so it doesn’t speed across the landscape. Stinknet is nothing but fuel for the fire.
What can we do to help our native flora and fauna? We can get rid of this plant. As most of you know, we at The Feathered Desert support chemical free yards. Stinknet doesn’t respond to most weed killer anyway, so we have to go old school. This past year my yard was covered in it, so I went out with a simple hula hoe and ripped it out of the ground. Jump on it as soon as you see it popping up in February and you can get ahead of it for the year. Tell your neighbors about it at your next HOA meeting or neighborhood gathering. Check out the show notes for this episode to print out or forward a great pamphlet created by the Arizona Parks and Wildlife that can help you identify this plant. Join The Tonto National Forest Friends of the Desert. They have days scheduled for volunteers to remove stinknet from our national forests. Also, if you are hiking or birding in a state or national park and you see it, tell the park rangers so they can remove it as soon as possible. They will be happy to hear from you.
I think I went a little over time with this one but as you can probably tell, stinknet sure gets under my skin. Thanks for listening and keep an eye out for this invasive plant.
Monday Jun 12, 2023
Monday Jun 12, 2023
Summary: How come birds always spit out that nasty tasting caterpillar? Do they have a sense of taste? Join Cheryl and Kiersten as they answer this question!
For our hearing impaired listeners, a transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.
Show Notes:
“Chapter 13: Taste in Birds,” by Shira L. Chelend Shoval, Zehava Uni, and Colin G. Scanes, Sturkie’s Avian Physiology (7th Edition) 2022, pg205-222.
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Transcript
Taste in Birds
Kiersten: Intro: Hello Feathered Desert listeners. Today Cheryl and I are here to talk about the sense of taste in birds. Now, if you’re anything like me, you grew up thinking birds had no sense of taste, but how come they always spit out that nasty tasting caterpillar? Well, we’re wrong! Birds, including songbirds, DO have a sense of taste and that’s what we’re going to talk about today.
Cheryl: If birds have a sense of taste, they have to have taste buds. And they do! Compared to mammals they have far fewer taste buds but they do have them.
Humans have taste buds on their tongue, and if you remember from grade school science, each type of taste has a different spot on the tongue. A spot for sweet, and spot for sour, and so on. Birds’ taste buds are found throughout their mouth not on their tongue. The greatest concentration of avian taste buds is found in the skin around the salivary glands of the mouth and the back of the tongue, and in the back of the mouth at the beginning of the throat.
How many taste buds do birds have? That answer depends on the species so, let’s look at the numbers.
One day old domestic chicken – 5 to 12 taste buds
Adult chicken – 24 taste buds
Blue tit – 24 taste buds
Bullfinch – 41 taste buds
Pigeon – 59 taste buds
European Starling – 200 taste buds
Parrot – 300 to 400 taste buds
Let’s compare these numbers to some other animals to give us some perspective.
Adult domestic cat – 2755 taste buds
Human – 6974 taste buds
Rabbit – 17,000 taste buds
Ox – 35,000 taste buds
Catfish – 100,000 taste buds
Kiersten: The study of taste in birds didn’t get off the ground until the 1970’s. It began with research into ducks. We found that ducks have 400 taste buds and if they used the tips of their beaks to pick up a pea, they could tell the difference between a normal pea and one that was unpleasant tasting. Research continued from there and one of the questions that scientists ask now is what different flavor profiles can birds recognize.
There are five recognized flavor profiles that humans can taste sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami. Scientists studied these five flavor profiles to see if birds could detect them in their food. Let’s start with the sweet profile.
Frugivores, birds that eat mainly fruit, and omnivores, birds that eat fruit, meat, and seeds, appear to prefer sweet more than other birds that are mainly seed foragers. They can actually tell the difference between different types of sugars. For instance, sucrose versus glucose versus fructose versus xylose. In scientific experiments, the birds tested, such as European starlings, Cape sugarbirds, and Lesser double-collard sunbirds, preferred certain types of sugars over other types. Overall, it appears that the main preference was for sucrose. The sunbirds and the sugarbirds didn’t even bother absorbing the xylose when offered that, it was simply excreted.
Preference was based on concentration levels when mixed with filtered water. Each species had different preferences based on which solution offered them the best caloric intake in regards to their specific lifestyle needs. And, yes, they tested hummingbirds! As we know they are one of the most famous nectar drinking birds in the world and they are picky about what they choose. It has to be just right for them to revisit a feeder and they can tell when the mixture is off by only 1%. So, remember 1 cup of granulated sugar to 4 cups of water. It’s the magic solution.
Cheryl: After sweet, one of humans’ favorite taste profiles is salty. This is actually the only real craving our body ever physically tells us about since sodium is extremely important to proper nerve function. Sorry, but your craving for chocolate is not a true physical craving.
When it comes to birds, the salty taste acts more as a deterrent than something that they favor. It’s important for birds to monitor how much salt is in their diet because too much can be dangerous and even deadly. In experiments, parrots rejected solutions with 0.35% salt levels or above and pine siskins rejected solutions of 37.5% or higher. The difference here is probably based on their dietary lifestyle. Parrots eat a lot of fruits while pine siskins eat mostly seeds and insects. Pine siskins can tolerate more salt in their diet. Red winged blackbirds and European starlings actually preferred water with a tiny bit of salt. They chose a sodium solution with 0.1% to 1% salt over clear, distilled water.
Pigeons are even more sensitive to salt solutions and they very quickly learn to tell the difference. Pigeons were presented a solution with a tiny amount of salt that was safe for them to drink and a solution with a toxic level of sodium. In under five minutes, they determined which one was okay to drink. That’s a pretty smart bird! This also proves that the pigeon was basing its decision on taste not side effects from drinking the toxic solution.
Sour is the next taste profile. Sour taste is typically associated with fermentation and, in birds, usually results in rejection of the food. The sourness detection level in various bird species is different which is, once again, most likely related to their natural diet. The red-winged blackbird and female starlings actually preferred their water with a tiny bit of citric acid even though most birds reject sour foods.
Kiersten: Let’s move on to bitter. I think this is the taste that started everything because, like I said in the opening, why do birds spit out bitter tasting caterpillars if they can’t taste? For that matter, why does the caterpillar bother making itself taste bad to ward off one of its most numerous predators if that predator can’t taste the bitterness.
To test the bitter palate scientists used quinine in a solution. It’s harmless to the birds but has a bitter taste. The threshold for bitter in birds was way lower than the sweet and salt. Birds do not want to eat anything bitter. This is most likely because bitter food often means poisonous food. Even European starlings, who preferred slightly salty and slightly sour solutions, completely rejected anything with even a tiny level of bitter. 14-day old domestic chickens could tell the difference between untreated food and food treated with 0.2% quinine solution. This shows how important avoiding bitter food is to bird survival.
Cheryl: Umami is the last flavor profile and we only have a little information about the ability for birds to detect umami. It was only accepted by scientists as an actual flavor profile in 2008, so research involving umami is lacking in more than just birds. What we do know is that male starlings prefer solutions with 0.7% to 1% umami over clear, distilled water. We also know that the umami receptor gene has been found in chickens’ genetic code.
Kiersten: Conclusion: In closing, birds do have a well-developed sense of taste that corresponds to their feeding behavior. So even though birds have fewer taste buds than other animals they definitely have a well-balanced sense of taste that helps them pick just the right food to flourish.