I submitted my siting to the online bird database. The first thing they told me – and I expected them to tell me this – was that I likely did not see what I told them I saw. But that’s ok, the data managers’ responsibility is to ensure the data submitted makes sense.
What I had seen was a black bellied whistling duck (BBWD). But I knew the bird was way out of its normal neighborhood. The BBWD is a bird of Florida and southeast Texas and up the Mississippi River as far as Tennessee. The map of its range can be seen on the black bellied whistling duck page of the terrific, on-line Cornell guide to birds. But it is not seen in a creek in the hills of Virginia. But that’s where I saw him, or rather them. Three BBWD standing in a creek on those long, very unduck-like legs with their long necks held high.
They looked quite at home in this lowland stream. And I was very much at home in the outdoors walking these woodland paths. I had not seen one of these long-legged ducks before, but I knew them from pictures. I was certain they were not geese. But I was surprised to see them there minding their business while I minded mine. As I watched them they flew off to some other more private stream. I imagine that they were heading back to a location that they are more use to. I watched them until they disappeared through the trees. I stood and continued to watch and listen in case they circled back. They did not.
What is it about birds that has the capability to enrapture us?
I think it’s because they make themselves available to us. They fly overhead. They will sit in a bush – perhaps hidden – and sing to us and to all of creation. They have the capability to remind us of the life and the beauty that is abundant in this world. And knowing this, they also remind us of our responsibility to enjoy and protect them, and to protect areas in which they can live so that they come back year in and year out to nest and sing and give new life and joy. The appearance of a certain bird may be a harbinger of spring. Or it may be an indication of a change in the weather, as gulls flocking inland may be warning of a storm. Their morning songs bring up the sun. And their last flights of evening bring the return to the nest and the calm of the night.
There are two birds in which I am currently interested as a volunteer citizen-scientist for a national park. I help with the park’s bird observation and management programs. It’s great. I have a reason to be out in the woods and the open fields. And it takes me out for the sunrise and into the new day that follows. I often hike to my listening stations in the pre-dawn darkness. It takes me out in the Spring and in the Fall and my task is – to listen to the birds sing.
I listen for the gentle call of the Northern Bobwhite Quail and the often hidden and reclusive Henslow’s Sparrow, a little bird of the open fields. The surveys each bird are repeated in selected areas along specific transects with established stations. It requires standing still and listening; it requires patience. Often I do not hear the quail whether it be the well-know “bob-white” call or the more muted nesting calls that might be heard. Nor do I often hear the Henslow’s Sparrow the thin, reedy notes that might rise and fall in the tall grass. But that’s all part of being outside. The birds are allowing me to share their home. I come with respect and quietness. And I am rewarded, if not by the song of my subject bird, by the call of all their feathered partners of the woods and fields.
Listening and surveying for these birds is part of an overall program to determine the health of the local environment and its ability to support these birds and birds similar to them. If the birds are present it means that they have an adequate food supply and have a place to perch, or hide, or loaf. I love that term and often picture the quail loafing around their nesting area. However, absence of these birds indicates that they and other birds may not find the food or cover or level of calmness that they like in order to take up and maintain residence in the area. As noted above we have a responsibility to ensure that we maintain and conserve areas where wildlife may thrive and we can go and loaf ourselves.
And the Whistling Ducks, they are welcome to come back anytime, but I agree with the purveyors of protocol on the bird site. This is not a normal occurrence, but it is the normal and the not-normal that continue to draw me outside to enjoy the birds, and the woods, streams and open fields.
Halcyon!
Picture is taken from Jules Breton’s painting “The Song of the Lark” from the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago.