Western Birds Journal

Volume 45, No. 4

Published October 1, 2014

Issue description

Volume 45, number 4 of Western Birds, published 2014

Articles

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    JAMES E. PIKE, KIMBALL L. GARRETT, ADAM J. SEARCY (Author)

    THE 38TH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE CALIFORNIA BIRD RECORDS COMMITTEE: 2012 RECORDS

    THE CALIFORNIA BIRD RECORDS COMMITTEE REACHED DECISIONS ON 280 RECORDS INVOLVING 525 INDIVIDUALS OF 88 SPECIES AND TWO SPECIES PAIRS DOCUMENTED SINCE THE 37TH REPORT (NELSON ET AL. 2013), ENDORSING 226 RECORDS OF 471 INDIVIDUALS. THE RECENT ADDITION OF THE SCALY-BREASTED MUNIA (FORMERLY NUTMEG MANNIKIN, LONCHURA PUNCTULATA) TO THE STATE LIST, AND THE SPLIT OF THE SAGE SPARROW INTO THE SAGEBRUSH SPARROW (ARTEMISIOSPIZA NEVADENSIS) AND BELL’S SPARROW (A. BELLI), COMBINED WITH FIRST ACCEPTED STATE RECORDS OF THE NORTHERN GANNET (MORUS BASSANUS), GRAY HAWK (BUTEO PLAGIATUS), AND COMMON CUCKOO (CUCULUS CANORUS) OUTLINED IN THIS REPORT, BRINGS CALIFORNIA’S TOTAL LIST OF ACCEPTED SPECIES TO 654, 11 OF WHICH, INCLUDING THE MUNIA, ARE ESTABLISHED INTRODUCTIONS. OTHER NOTABLE RECORDS DETAILED IN THIS REPORT ARE OF THE COMMON CRANE (GRUS GRUS), WOOD SANDPIPER (TRINGA GLAREOLA), AND VARIED BUNTING (PASSERINA VERSICOLOR).

     
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    KATHARINE A. HOWARD, MATTHEW D. JOHNSON (Author)

    EFFECTS OF NATURAL HABITAT ON PEST CONTROL IN CALIFORNIA VINEYARDS

     ECOSYSTEM SERVICES PROVIDED BY WILDLIFE CAN OFFER POWERFUL INCENTIVES FOR CONSERVATION, PARTICULARLY IF SPECIES CAN BE LINKED TO NATURAL HABITAT. WE EXAMINED THE HYPOTHESIS THAT NATURAL HABITATS ADJACENT TO VINEYARDS PROVIDE A SOURCE OF INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS BY TESTING THE PREDICTION THAT PREDATION RATES SHOULD BE HIGHER CLOSE TO OAK WOODLAND THAN IN THE INTERIOR OF A VINEYARD. WE SIMULATED AN INSECT OUTBREAK IN FOUR SMALL VINEYARDS ALL ADJACENT TO OAK WOODLAND. THERE WAS NO EVIDENCE THAT PREDATION WAS HIGHER ALONG EDGES OF VINEYARDS THAN IN THE INTERIOR. WE DID FIND THAT BIRDS RESPONDED QUICKLY TO A SIMULATED OUTBREAK OF INSECT LARVAE, WITH PREDATION RATES DURING THE LATE SUMMER REACHING 90%. MOTION-SENSING CAMERAS REVEALED THAT THE MOST COMMON PREDATOR OF THE LARVAE WAS THE WESTERN BLUEBIRD (SIALIA MEXICANA). THESE RESULTS SUGGEST THAT VINEYARD MANAGERS MAY TAKE ADVANTAGE OF BIOLOGICAL PEST CONTROL OFFERED BY SONGBIRDS AND PERHAPS INCREASE CONTROL BY ACTIVELY MANAGING FOR THE BIRDS, A POTENTIALLY BENEFICIAL SCENARIO FOR BOTH VINEYARD MANAGERS AND BIRD CONSERVATION.

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    CAMERON L. RUTT, PETER PYLE, PAUL W. COLLINS, MATTHEW L. BRADY, JAMES R. TIETZ, JON L. DUNN (Author)

    THE NOMINATE SUBSPECIES OF THE PURPLE FINCH IN CALIFORNIA AND WESTERN NORTH AMERICA

    THE PURPLE FINCH (HAEMORHOUS PURPUREUS) IS MOST OFTEN RECOGNIZED AS COMPRISING TWO DISTINCT SUBSPECIES: PURPUREUS, BREEDING AND WINTERING THROUGH MOST OF CANADA AND THE EASTERN UNITED STATES, AND CALIFORNICUS, REPORTED TO BE LARGELY RESIDENT ALONG THE PACIFIC COAST, FROM BRITISH COLUMBIA TO SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. ALTHOUGH THE MIGRATORY PURPUREUS IS THE SUBSPECIES EXPECTED AS A VAGRANT IN ALASKA AND THE INTERIOR WEST, THE IDENTITY OF THE SUBSPECIES OCCURRING IN THESE REGIONS HAS BEEN POORLY DOCUMENTED. HERE WE DOCUMENT THE FIRST RECORDS OF PURPUREUS FOR CALIFORNIA AND ASSESS THE SUBSPECIES OF THE PURPLE FINCH FROM PHOTOGRAPHS AND SPECIMENS THROUGHOUT WESTERN NORTH AMERICA. NOMINATE PURPUREUS OCCURS REGULARLY IN THE WESTERN GREAT PLAINS STATES AND VERY SPARSELY FARTHER WEST. H. P. CALIFORNICUS MAY BE MORE PRONE TO VAGRANCY THAN PREVIOUSLY SUSPECTED, AS WE DOCUMENT THE FIRST RECORDS FOR ALASKA, COLORADO, AND NEW MEXICO.

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    RODNEY B. SIEGEL, ROBERT L. WILKERSON, MORGAN W. TINGLEY, CHRISTINE A. HOWELL (Author)

    ROOST SITES OF THE BLACK-BACKED WOODPECKER IN BURNED FOREST

    The Black-backed Woodpecker (Picoides arcticus) is strongly associated with recently burned forest, which makes it vulnerable to salvage logging or other post-fire forest management that removes snags. As part of a larger radio-telemetry study of the species’ resource use and habitat selection in a burned forest in California, we located radio-tagged Black-backed Woodpeckers at night to find and describe their roost sites. We found 14 unique roost locations during night-time searches for five individual birds. Description of the micro-site on the tree that the bird used was impossible at five roosts where we could not visually locate the bird in the dark. At the nine roosts confirmed visually, none of the birds roosted in excavated cavities. Rather, they roosted in sheltered spaces within burned-out hollows of trunks (5 instances), in the crook of a forked trunk (1 instance), wedged between adjacent trunks of two closely spaced trees (1 instance), in a deep, natural bark furrow (1 instance), and clinging to a trunk directly above a horizontal branch (1 instance). Eleven of the 14 roosts (79%) were in dead trees. Our results suggest that in burned forests the Black-backed Woodpecker may benefit if, during salvage logging, emphasis is placed on retaining snags with burned-out hollows, forked trunks, or other relatively unusual structures that may create crevices or other opportunities for shelter.

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    JEFFREY M. KOZMA (Author)

    CHARACTERISTICS OF SITES OF WESTERN BLUEBIRD NESTS IN MANAGED PONDEROSA PINE FORESTS OF WASHINGTON

    I compared characteristics of sites of Western Bluebird (Sialia mexicana) nests in natural tree cavities in burned and unburned logged ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa) forests along the east slope of the Cascade Range of Washington, 2003–2008 and 2010. Tree density and percent debris cover (litter and large woody debris) were greater at nest sites in unburned stands because fire kills live trees and consumes woody debris, and they were the only characteristics in which nest sites in burned and unburned forests differed. In burned stands cavities were oriented primarily east, whereas in unburned stands they were oriented randomly. East-facing cavities may be thermally advantageous early in the day, keeping eggs warmer when the incubating female is away foraging. Most snags containing bluebird nest cavities (73%) were advanced in decay and had broken tops. Of the cavities whose original excavator was known, 27% were excavated by the Hairy Woodpecker (Picoides villosus), 12% by the White-headed Woodpecker (P. albolarvatus), and 5% by the Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus). Only one nest was located in a non-excavated cavity. Of the 38 second nests, 76% were in the same cavity as the first, even though 38% of these first attempts were unsuccessful, suggesting that suitable cavities are limiting. My results suggest that bluebirds use similar nest sites in burned and unburned ponderosa pine stands and that abandoned woodpecker cavities are critical to the Western Bluebird in these managed forests.

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    DEREK B. HALL, PAUL D. GREGER (Author)

    DOCUMENTING WESTERN BURROWING OWL REPRODUCTION AND ACTIVITY PATTERNS WITH MOTION-ACTIVATED CAMERAS

     We used motion-activated cameras to monitor the reproduction and patterns of activity of the Burrowing Owl (Athene cunicularia) above ground at 45 burrows in south-central Nevada during the breeding seasons of 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2005. The 37 broods, encompassing 180 young, raised over the four years represented an average of 4.9 young per successful breeding pair. Young and adult owls were detected at the burrow entrance at all times of the day and night, but adults were detected more frequently during afternoon/early evening than were young. Motion-activated cameras require less effort to implement than other techniques. Limitations include photographing only a small percentage of owl activity at the burrow; not detecting the actual number of eggs, young, or number fledged; and not being able to track individual owls over time. Further work is also necessary to compare the accuracy of productivity estimates generated from motion-activated cameras with other techniques.

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    FERNANDO MONDACA-FERNÁNDEZ, ISRAEL MORENO-CONTRERAS (Author)

    PRESENCE OF THE NEOTROPIC CORMORANT IN CHIHUAHUA, MEXICO

    We used motion-activated cameras to monitor the reproduction and patterns of activity of the Burrowing Owl (Athene cunicularia) above ground at 45 burrows in south-central Nevada during the breeding seasons of 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2005. The 37 broods, encompassing 180 young, raised over the four years represented an average of 4.9 young per successful breeding pair. Young and adult owls were detected at the burrow entrance at all times of the day and night, but adults were detected more frequently during afternoon/early evening than were young. Motion-activated cameras require less effort to implement than other techniques. Limitations include photographing only a small percentage of owl activity at the burrow; not detecting the actual number of eggs, young, or number fledged; and not being able to track individual owls over time. Further work is also necessary to compare the accuracy of productivity estimates generated from motion-activated cameras with other techniques.

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    PHILIP UNITT (Author)

    THANKS TO WESTERN BIRDS’ REVIEWERS AND ASSOCIATE EDITORS

     Peer review is a critical step in the publication of a scientific journal. I thank the following people for their generosity in taking the time to provide this essential service sustaining the scientific quality of Western Birds for volume 45

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    FLOYD E. HAYES (Author)

    INLAND RECORDS OF THE BLACK SKIMMER IN THE WESTERN UNITED STATES

     In the western United States west of the 100th meridian, the Black Skimmer (Rynchops niger) was fist recorded in coastal southern California on 8 September 1962 (Audubon Field Notes 17:69) and fist recorded inland, at the Salton Sea in southeastern California, on 3 July 1968 (McCaskie and Suffel 1971). After breeding began at the Salton Sea in 1972 (McCaskie et al. 1974), the Black Skimmer rapidly expanded its distribution in California, with an estimated breeding population of 1200 pairs in 1995 (Collins and Garrett 1996) and 1400–1500 pairs in 2005 (Molina 2008) in breeding colonies at the Salton Sea and scattered coastal localities as far north as south San Francisco Bay (Collins and Garrett 1996, Molina 1996, 2008). Skimmers occasionally wander along the coast north of San Francisco to Bodega Bay in Sonoma County (Bolander and Parmeter 2000), rarely farther north. In Humboldt County, a pair was seen at Eureka from 17 to 23 August 2004 (N. Am. Birds [NAB] 59:144) and one was at McKinleyville on 19 July 2005 (NAB 59:651). Another turned up at Crescent City, Del Norte County, on 13 July 2007 (NAB 61:638). A skimmer subsequently seen at Pistol River in Curry County, Oregon, on 26 January 2008 (NAB 62:294, Irons 2008), represents the northernmost record in western North America.