WW is from Amanda R & Dr. Robert D

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

Consequences as a result of the disruption in my rooftop garden and the work space in my home that I mentioned in yesterday's post are something I will be contending with today. Therefore this entry for this week's WW (Wednesday's Wisdom) will be brief. The wise words offered here come from Amanda Remsberg and Robert Robert DeCandido PhD.

I contacted both of them yesterday to ask a question about a Common Grackle whom I encountered when I was in Central Park this past Sunday. He/she is featured in the image atop this entry. A few minutes after this lovely creature gave me the once over...

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

... he/she began to exhibit behavior (seen in the next series of pictures) that I thought was one of those fake an-injured-wing thing which is common in the avian community.

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

But I had never seen such a young one doing the fake-a-broken-wing thing and seeing this caused me to wonder if the creature was practicing this "technique" or learning it or imitating it. I did a fair amount of research in hopes of finding out if I could determine what might've been happening, but I could not find out ant information so I reached out to my cyber buddy Amanda Remsberg (bird rehabber extraordinaire) via Messenger stating:

I saw a Common Grackle in Central Park  on Sunday and he/she was "walking" around the lawn but when this bird seemed to realize I was there, he/she seemed to the fake-an-injured-wing thing. Do you think this young bird was practicing this skill? Do young birds learn to do this early on + practice it? I can't find any research on the topic!

Here's a copy of our exchange:

AR: And he wasn’t injured?  Lol. No never seen that behavior in grackles at all!  Possible he might have been anting?  They rub their wings on an ant pile to pick up the Formica acid that can repel mites.

ME: Hmmm. Maybe he was anting but he/she seemed to look at me (I included  a copy of the photo directly below) and then do the wing bit. Maybe this young bird saw an older bird do the wing bit  and is coping the behavior without knowing why? Then again maybe  anting was the activity. It was a very hot day and sparrows were dust bathing in another location.

COMMON GRACKLES ARE FEATURED IN "WORDS IN OUR BEAK"

AR: Maybe he was flirting, such a cutie! Lol. Birds do a lot of odd things we are hard pressed to explain sometimes.

After AR's suggested that the bird I saw might've been anting, I did some more research and I reached out (via email( to Robert DeCandido PhD, a bird expert whom I've mentioned in prior posts here on Blogger.

Here's a copy of our exchange:

ME: I saw this Common Grackle (I included the third and fourth images seen in this posting) in on Sunday + at first I thought he/she was doing a pretend-to-have-broken-wing thing but it didn’t seem there was any danger around. Do  you think the bird could have been anting?

DR. R: Hi Patricia - we see this behavior all the time: a bird sitting motionless in the sun on the ground usually with feathers spread ; the bird looks dazed but if approached rights itself and flys off just fine 

The birds have parasites deep in their feathers. By spreading feathers in the sun they allow the heat to penetrate; the parasites do not like the heat and start to move around looking for a better spot; the bird preens them out...basically in an abbreviated explanation ...

That's it for today, dear reader, except to remind you that Common Grackles are  featured in volume three of my book series, Words In Our Beak, and to once again thank both Amanda and Robert for sharing their knowedge with me!

THE WORDS IN OUR BEAK BOOK SERIES

Wednesday's Wisdom: Ask Robert DeCandido

Last evening while walking home through Central Park, I stopped by the deck near the Delacorte  Theatre in hopes of seeing a Great Egret whom I've noticed at this location often (which I've blogged about in prior entries) but he/she was not there.

However, thanks to the long lens of my camera, I was able to notice a male Red-Winged Blackbird alighting on the dense foliage (as evidenced in the photo atop this entry) so I decided to head in that direction to see if I could get a closer look at him.

By the time I got to where I had seen this creature, he was not there, but I did hear a bird singing within that dense foliage and was able to take pictures of the songster. My images can be seen directly below.

As I was heading down a path I noticed a man looking through binoculars and I assumed he was observing birds so I showed him the pictures I had just taken in hopes that he might help me ID the creature I'd just seen.

A Red-Winged Blackbird is Bird Number Eight! (Monday's Musings)

This past Friday I met my eighth new bird type (who can seen in the photographs posted directly above) in this Year of The Bird! I encountered the little fellow when I was walking in Central Park.

This particular is a member of the Red-Winged Blackbird family and his ID, as well as his gender, was confirmed for me by Robert DeCandido PhD. As you may recall, dear reader, DeCandido is the one who ID-ed a Great Blue Heron whom I came upon in Central Park earlier this year. You might also remember that he a provided bird information (gender) when I met a Bufflehead Duck for the first time. Both bird types can be seen in the photos below (respectively).

In any event, I'm very grateful for DeCandido and I hope I can afford to participate in one of his many bird walks in the near future.

But getting back to my coming upon a Red-Winged Black Bird, my encounter with him was by mere chance, for I had gone to the park and headed to the pond in hopes of seeing an American Coot, a bird type that I initially encountered on March 19th under very bad conditions for taking a photo and I was hoping to get a better picture of this bird.

Bufflehead Duck in Central Park's Reservoir (Tuesday's Truths 74th WK )

Welcome to week seventy-fourth of my Tuesday's Truths series. Let me begin by saying that yesterday I took a walk in Central Park, and when I was walking around the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, I encountered a bird type whom I've never seen before. He can be seen in the photographs atop this entry.

Thursday's Tale: Yet another walk in the park. (A View From OAK Bridge)

This past Monday, even though temperatures were only in the twenty-degree range, with "real feel" temperatures much colder, I took a walk in Central Park; to see how our wildlife was faring in the bitter cold.

After all, beyond-frigid temperatures haven't stopped me from going to the park before. As you may recall, from a previous post here on Blogger, I took a walk in Central Park earlier in the month when temperatures were far below what they were this past Monday.

The first photograph atop this entry was featured in the aforementioned blog entry, and I'm including it in this posting as I have a correction to make, for I stated that the view being featured in the image was a view from Bow Bridge, but I had a senior moment in stating this, the view is actually from the Oak Bridge, which I returned to Monday afternoon and took the following picture of the same subject from that vantage point.

The only difference is I zoomed in quite a bit (so a view of one of NYC's sky-lines is not included here as it was in the image I took earlier in January). I zoomed so that I could capture a bird type whom I've never seen in Central Park, or anywhere else for that matter.

I've indicated this bird by affixing an orange square to the second photo below (which is a duplicate of the first one that's there).

A passerby indicated that the bird who was new to me was a type of Egret. However, I did not take her at her word before writing this post, as I don't want to be accused of reporting fake news, which I inadvertently did when I referred to the view from this bridge as being from the Bow Bridge; and not the Oak Bridge, as I've just stated.

Upon my realizing that I'd confused the Bow Bridge with the Oak Bridge, I thought of a passage from Joan Didion's, Goodbye to All That, an essay on Didion's decision to leave NYC (which she ultimately moved back to years later):

".... All I could do during those years was talk long-distance to the boy I already knew I would never marry in the spring. I would stay in New York, I told him, just six months, and I could see the Brooklyn Bridge from my window. As it turned out the bridge was the Triborough, and I stayed eight years.
—-
     In retrospect it seems to me that those days before I knew the names of all the bridges were happier than the ones that came later..."

Meanwhile, in terms of the bird who was new to me, I thought that I was ultimately able to find out his/her correct type from someone in my Twitter feed. Susan M. Thom, Esq solved my mystery, after I tweeted images of this bird and asked for an identification (since I could not find it in my own research).

My Brief Encounter with a lone Winter Wren (and nearby Mallards)

Last Saturday when I took my weekly walk with CF, I spotted the tiny creature (thanks to my long camera lens) seen in the one and only photograph that I was able to get and it is atop this entry. I have now learned his/her identity through the NYC bird expert, Robert DeCandido PhD.

The little one I saw is a Winter Wren, a type of fauna whom I've never seen before.

After learning the ID, my research led me to many interesting facts re Winter Wrens, including a  web-page for Bird Watcher's Digest, explaining, "The winter wren is one of North America’s smallest birds, kinglet-sized and rounded in shape like a small teapot, with a short stubby tail for a spout. Its bill is short and thin. Dark brown feathers suit its skulking habits, for this is a bird that likes to hide among the leaf litter or crawl into dark crevices in rocks or the cavities created by fallen logs. (Its scientific name, Troglodytes, means 'cave dweller.') Often found along stream banks or thick roadside tangles, this wren may pass unnoticed much of the time unless you are attuned to its double-click chip note. In the breeding season, however, males will often establish a perch on top of a snag and remain there for long periods as they sing their glorious, bubbly song."