Cedar Waxwings plundering fruit, courting

 

My front yard Downy Serviceberry (Amelanchier arborea). It's an older plant and may be on the far side of middle age. But it still has seasons where it produces a bounty of sugary berries, and this is one of those years. And lots of serviceberry fruit means lots of birds.

Yes! Says a Cedar Waxwing as it enters the tree. Such an environment, to a waxwing, is akin to a kid falling into a giant bowl of M & M's. And it isn't just waxwings that visit. American Robins, Eastern Bluebirds, Gray Catbirds and others drop in for snacks. But I must confess that the suave waxwings are my favorite.

As always, click the photo to enlarge

A waxwing ponders which tasty fruit to pluck. The crop is just beginning to ripen, and from my observations, they like them ripe and red. Given the amount of fruit on this treelet, I should have waxwing visitors for some time to come.

A waxwing with freshly plucked berry. It'll be down his/her hatch soon. Fortunately, waxwings are pretty tame, and I can stand in one of my garage bays with door open and shoot them from there. They know I'm there but aren't bothered a bit. Even people walking by on the sidewalk - closer than my position - often don't flush them.

A pair in the act of passing a berry. This courtship feeding is a pair-bonding ritual, and I've seen it a number of times over the past few days, but it is difficult to photograph, usually because the birds are obstructed by branches and foliage when they do it. I'll keep at it and try for better material. Anyway, the fruit exchange is usually just once - probably mostly male to female - but this case was unusual in that they swapped the fruit back and forth five times, with the initial recipient (her, I assume) finally eating it.

Cedar Waxwings are effective frugivores, with an insatiable appetite for sugary fruit like these serviceberries. While they efficiently digest the soft parts of the fruit, the seeds probably mostly pass through their systems intact, to be expelled elsewhere - probably, in many cases, a long distance from where they were harvested. So, in addition to pleasing us with their suave elegance (certainly the least important thing that waxwings do), they are important agents of dispersal for plants.

Cedar Waxwing: A late nester

 

An adult Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum), looking elegant. This one was part of a small flock at Magee Marsh in Lucas County, Ohio, yesterday. I was there looking for warblers and other neotropical migrant songbirds, and suave waxwings always catch my eye.

Here's a juvenile waxwing, which was part of the same group. It is easily told from an adult by its thick smudgy streaking, undeveloped crest, and general lack of coloration and overall brownish cast. There were a few juveniles in this assemblage of 8-10 birds.

The juveniles struck me as very young, so I wasn't overly surprised to see one being fed by an adult, even on this late date (September 29). Cedar Waxwing is among the latest routinely breeding songbirds in this region. Second broods are not too unusual in August and September. Unfortunately, this juvenile is being fed a nonnative Amur Honeysuckle (Lonicera maackii) berry. Birds are the major dispersal agents for this invasive shrub, and I'd say that waxwings, American Robins, and European Starlings are the primary dispersers.

Waxwings feasting on sumac fruit

A gorgeous pre-dawn sunrise. Sunrises always look best before the sun crests the horizon. The colors are much more vivid. Back on February 15, I took a long overdue trip to the central basin region of Lake Erie. As I passed through Crawford County north of Bucyrus, the eastern skyline kept intensifying in color. Finally, I could no longer stand it and pulled onto a side road to make this shot. It was 7 F at the time and cold temperatures seem to bring out the best in sunrises.

After a highly productive day of finding and photographing a variety of birds, I stopped in at a prairie relict near Castalia, in Erie County. A Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) has been hanging in the vicinity, and I missed seeing the bird at the usual haunts - the only real miss that I had on this day. Anyway, I figured I'd get out on foot for a while, see what I could see, and hope that the big eagle might pass over. One usually sees far more on foot than in a vehicle.

At one point, a bunch of American Robins (Turdus migratorius) flew into a nearby Eastern Cottonwood (Populus deltoides). They were mostly quiet, only giving whisper calls amongst each other. I figured they had a target and a plan, and sure enough a little way over was a fine grove of Smooth Sumac (Rhus glabra) with plenty of fruit.

A stand of Smooth Sumac loaded with tasty fruit. There are four species of sumac in the genus Rhus in Ohio, and all produce fruit coveted by birds. One species, Fragrant Sumac (R. aromatica) is much shorter in stature than the others, and because it is somewhat easier to manage, it's probably the most frequently used in landscaping. However, the three bigger species produce more fruit, and put those colorful fruiting clusters high in the air where the birds can't miss them.

An American Robin feasts on sumac fruit. Many of his compadres joined him.

This situation was a photographic goldmine, especially to me because of my long-going effort to document animals feeding on or otherwise using native flora. The problem was that I was exactly on the wrong side of the light - looking straight into the late day sun. Fortunately, I had my lightweight Canon R5 and 400 DO II (with 1.4x extender) in hand. Eventually I was able to work around the sumac colony and get the light behind me, without spooking the birds. Moving through the prairie vegetation with a bigger rig and cumbersome tripod would have made it much harder to move stealthily and not spook the birds.

A gorgeous adult Cedar Waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum) looks about from a bare shrub. As I got into good position, I heard the high-pitched wheezy trills of waxwings. Major bonus! Cedar Waxwings often occur with robins in winter, as they are after the same fruits. While I did have robin/sumac shots, I had never captured waxwings feeding on sumac fruit, so they quickly became my priority.

The waxwings - there were only a few - would stage on a bare shrub to look about before dropping into the sumac. I missed shooting the first few birds, but not this one. The animal posed stunningly for a second or two, glancing over its shoulder, crest erect, and wings and tail splayed slightly to reveal their colorful charms.

PHOTOGRAPHIC NOTE: When the light is abundant, as it was here, I prefer to stop down to f/8 or even f/11 if possible. I almost always shoot birds in manual mode, with the ISO on auto. I watch the ISO like a hawk, and it can largely drive what aperture and shutter speed that I use. In a perfect world (for me) the ISO is no higher than 500-800. Low ISOs mean less noisy images, especially if much cropping is necessary. Cameras are getting better at processing higher ISO settings, but I still do what I can to keep them as low as possible. Anyway, the settings for this shot were: f/8, 1/1000, ISO 320, with 0.3+ EV. In hindsight I probably would have stopped down to f/9 or f/10 and dropped the shutter speed to 1/640 or so but I'm nitpicking my efforts.

Caught in the act! An amazing array of songbirds feed on sumac. I've probably photographed 15 species on it and have seen a number of others eating it that I could not photograph. And I should say that it's not just songbirds. Woodpeckers, especially the Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus), often visit sumac to plunder the berries.

If you are looking for good bird photography opportunities, stake out a sumac stand in winter. With some patience (and quietness) you'll almost certainly be rewarded with interesting opportunities of birds interacting with these showy native treelets.

Cedar Waxwing

 

An adult Cedar Waxwing might be the epitome of feathered elegance. I photographed this one on June 8, at Cedar Bog, Champaign County, Ohio.

Dawes Arboretum's holly collection - and its birds

A Northern Mockingbird guards "his" patch of possumhaw, Ilex decidua. There were plenty of would-be frugivorous marauders to fend off.

A few days ago, I ventured to the always interesting Dawes Arboretum, near Newark, Ohio. The arboretum sprawls over nearly 2,000 acres, and much of the landscape is natural habitats. But much of the site is also a showcase of various ornamentals, although some of these plants are native, at least to the eastern U.S.

My target was the holly collection, a colorful section heavily planted with a dizzying array of various holly species and their cultivars. I knew many of the trees and shrubs would be heavily laden with fruit, and there would be fruit-eating birds in photogenic settings.

A striking male American Robin tees up on American holly, Ilex opaca. Robins abounded, and I never tire of photographing them. The opportunity to present these handsome thrushes amid equally handsome plants festooned with colorful fruit was irresistible, and many shutter clicks were directed towards Turdus migratorius.

As is often the case in winter, large numbers of Cedar Waxwings mingled with the robins. These suave animals were a primary target on this day, and I had plenty of opportunities. Here, a juvenile waxwing watches an elder scarf down the berry of an American holly.

By just standing quietly among shrubs, and waiting for the birds to come to nearby favored berry bushes, it was quite easy to make satisfying images. Because the skies were cloudy and dark, it was necessary to use fill flash - I generally prefer natural light. But this was good practice, and allowed me to capture images that I couldn't have otherwise made.

If you're looking for a great place to visit, bird, and photograph, make a foray to Dawes Arboretum. CLICK HERE for more information.

A parliament of Cedar Waxwings

Too much STUFF has kept me out of the blogosphere of late, or at least much reduced my normal volume of posts. That might continue for a few weeks.

But I've not been idle, and have scads of material. For now, I will leave interested readers with this dignified parliament of Cedar Waxwings, lording over the summit of a tall pin oak. They were part of a flock of about 120 birds at Stage's Pond State Nature Preserve last Friday morning. After the group preening was complete, they descended en masse on lianas of wild grape and plundered the berry crops.

Robins, waxwings, and honeysuckle

Amur honeysuckle, Lonicera maackii, cloaks the understory of an Ohio woodland. This plant, and a few other closely related species, would get my vote as worst invasive species of upland habitats. This post is meant only as a (mostly) pictorial offering of evidence as to how the honeysuckle gets scattered far and wide. If you would like to read in more detail about the evils of these shrubs, CLICK HERE.

The first photo in this post was made in early spring, when the honeysuckle was just leafing out. Later would come (admittedly) very showy flowers. Pretty flowers and beautiful fruit are the main reasons that these shrubs were imported to the New World. What a mistake that was. Honeysuckle now runs rampant, and chokes out all manner of native species.

An American Robin perches jauntily in a sea of tasty berries. It, and many others, were plundering a small patch of Amur honeysuckle shrubs in Jasper-Pulaski Wildlife Area last Saturday. I was in Indiana to see and photograph the spectacular congregation of migrating Sandhill Cranes, and will soon post about that experience (once I get my myriad photos sorted).

A robin, caught in the act. At least a dozen robins were raiding this shrub, and consuming several to a dozen berries with each foray. They and the other fruit-eating honeysuckle birds can strip a sizable shrub in a day or two.

Down the hatch goes a honeysuckle berry. Shrubs that produce brightly colored berries are generally doing so to attract birds. The showy fruit is irresistible to robins and other frugivorous birds. While the soft pulp is quickly digested, the hard seeds within are much tougher to digest, and some of them will pass through the bird's digestive tract intact. They will be expelled later, quite likely some distance from the source shrub. This is one of many ways in which plants "migrate".
  

Were these the fruit of some native shrub, I would be much prouder of this photo. After all, it is a reasonably crisp shot of one of our most elegant birds, the Cedar Waxwing. But alas, the debonair chap sits among more of the nasty Amur honeysuckle.

Like robins, waxings are huge fans of berries and a flock can intake great quantities in short order.

I would think that eating one of these berries, were you the size of a waxwing, would be akin to you or I eating a large melon. There were at least as many waxwings working over the honeysuckle as there were robins. In the relatively short period that I monitored their activities, the birds probably ate hundreds of berries.

When one considers the overall numbers of robins, waxwings, and other species of fruit-eating birds, it's small wonder that invasive berry bushes such as honeysuckles spread so prolifically.

Cedar Waxwing

Cedar Waxwing, victim of a window strike, Franklin County, Ohio, May 27, 2011. My brother Mike tipped me to this waxwing, which had struck the building in which he works, and I took the opportunity to make some photos of the unfortunate waxwing. Scores of birds are killed in building collisions each year.

We always experience a late pulse of migrant Cedar Waxwings towards May's end, and flocks frequent the ornamental trees around the buildings where I work, picking over remnant fruits from the previous season. This birds lacks the telltale "wax wings"; the shiny reddish feather tips on the wings which gives the species its name. This means it is a first-year bird - it takes Cedar Waxwings two years to develop their namesake field mark.

The trademark dipped in yellow ink tail, up close. Waxwings are without doubt among our most suave and dapper animals. They give the appearance of impeccable grooming and classy dress, and possess a manners and a civility far beyond most other birds.

The lemony-yellow belly grades into soft brownish and gray tones - a most pleasing overall effect.

A waxwing's fawn-colored head is accented with a crisp black mask and throat, and capped with a neat sleeked back crest.Note the bill, which is an effective tool for gutting fruits and berries. For much of the year, waxwings are frugivorous - fruit-eaters.

While it's a shame that this Cedar Waxwing had to perish because of a shiny window, it did offer an opportunity for us to closely examine its intricate details. It'll eventually become a museum specimen and thus should be of use to researchers in the future.

Waxwing and rare fern

Yesterday was the Hocking Hills Christmas Bird count, and I canvassed my assigned region along with Peter King, Heather Aubke, Nina Harfmann, and Gabe Leidy. We managed about 54 species - not a bad start to the New Year.

Sharp-eyed Gabe spotted a flock of about 75 Cedar Waxwings ravaging a line of ornamental fruit-bearing trees. We spent a bit of time admiring these debonair chaps - truly they rank high among the world's suavest of birds.

I had to spend some time firing off shots, while the waxwings regarded me with polite aloofness. They are far too civilized to shrilly scold, but one gets the feeling that somehow a mere person is below their rank. Beholden of manners far beyond most of their brethren, waxwings display extraordinary social graces for a bird. They are even known to pass fruit along to their mates.

This special locale seems to be an annual fixture on my blog, but so be it - I am always delighted to see that one of Ohio's two known colonies of Appalachian Filmy Fern, Trichomanes boschianum, still exists. Here, a throng of would-be fern enthusiasts adds a "life fern" to their as yet to be created fern life list: (l to R) Nina, Heather, and an astonished Peter.

It was my good fortune to discover that my assigned area for the bird count harbored the filmy fern, so it goes without saying that a visit is in order each winter. And even though it is cold, the fern still flourishes in its nearly subterranean haunts. I'd like to divulge its location to you, but I can't - you never know who is reading these things. Maybe a fern poacher.

It seemed to me that the patch of filmy fern had expanded ever so slightly since last winter. But there still isn't much, and its existence is a rather tenuous thing. If you'd like to read more of the Appalachian Filmy Fern, CLICK HERE.