The Return of a Pelican: 53861, “Copper Woman,” is Back!

Posted on October 16, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

UPDATE: While looking through pics from this fall, I was able to definitively get the first four numbers off of Copper Woman’s band and submit the full 9-digit number to the BBL. Copper Woman is also known as 0669-53861. She was banded as a chick in 2008 and originated from Marsh Lake, Minnesota.

Now to the original post.

When I see a tagged pelican at White Rock Lake, I report her to the Bird Banding Laboratory. Last year I reported birds that originated at Marsh Lake in Minnesota; Chase Lake in North Dakota; the Great Salt Lake in Utah; and Minidoka National Wildlife Refuge in Idaho. I see many more banded pelicans than tagged ones, but I can usually only decipher a few numbers from the bands, and the BBL only accepts the entire nine-digit code.

Last January I was able to get five numbers off a pelican’s band: 53861. I saw her again a few months later at White Rock Lake, and I suspect she was there throughout that interval, although it would be difficult to confirm.

Two days ago, when the pelicans moved to the Stump and the Shore Log, much closer to people than before, I noticed a pelican with a coppery-looking band on her left leg. I’d never seen a band of that color and tried to get pics to decipher the number. I didn’t succeed.

But today I did.

And when I read the numbers that were visible, they were the same numbers as the pelican from last year: 53861. I suspect that the copper coloration might be from the band changing colors as it ages. Regardless, I shall call the pelican Copper Woman.

Pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) jumps on a log next to another pelican at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Copper Woman jumps onto the Shore Log on January 10, 2014.

Pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) beats her wings at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

She beats her wings triumphantly.

Four pelicans (american white pelicans; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) stand on a log at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Copper Woman is on the far left.

A pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) stands on a log at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Copper Woman on the Shore Log on October 15, 2014. Welcome back!

Cold, Sleepy Pelicans and a Loner on a Stump: October 11

Posted on October 12, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Last week was fairly warm. One day the temp was even in the high 90s, but the rest of the days peaked in the low 90s. Yesterday, the 10th, the high was 91.

Twenty-four hours later, the temperature had fallen over 30 degrees.

Q and I had been busy this afternoon visiting houses on the yearly White Rock Lake Artists’ Tour and didn’t get out to White Rock Lake until late afternoon. I was wearing a sweater and a light jacket, and I was still freezing. I like hot weather and don’t deal well with the cold, especially when the temperature has changed dramatically within a short period of time.

Over the past few days I’d noticed a sudden resurgence in the number of scissor-tailed flycatchers I’d seen at the lake. After Q and I got out of the car, we noticed several of them swooping around and perching in trees and on wires.

When we got down to the dock, we saw that almost all of the pelicans on the nearby log were asleep. Alas!

Then I looked to one side and saw that there was a lone pelican standing on the Stump. Q and I decided to go walk down to the shore to get a better look at her.

Something was wrong with the bird. Not just that she was by herself, but her left foot seemed to be injured.

Typically pelicans stand with their feet flat against a surface. This bird kept holding her left foot slightly up in a curved position. When she raised her wings for more than a few seconds, she had a great deal of difficulty keeping her balance. When she tried to sit, she lurched down and to the side and then straightened up again. For the majority of the time that we watched her preen, she was standing with her left foot stretched much further out than her right foot, as though she weren’t holding much weight on it. I couldn’t see anything wrong with her leg or foot, so I hope that whatever is bothering her will resolve soon. I once saw a pelican who had lost a foot, and although the injury looked as though it had healed well, it severely impacted how the pelican dealt with loafing. It was sad to see.

K arrived and said that she had seen the Stump Pelican (now named Philoctetes) earlier that afternoon. She said the bird had left the others, swam up to the stump, and hopped on. At the time K hadn’t noticed anything wrong with her. When I pointed out the bird’s strange posture and the way she lurched when she tried to change positions, K agreed that something wasn’t right.

Another local birder and prominent blogger, Ben, showed up. He told us that the influx of scissor-tailed flycatchers was due to northern birds migrating south. An anomaly explained!

By then my toes were starting to get numb, so Q and I left. Tomorrow the temperature is supposed to get back up into the low 80s. Thank god. That’s the kind of weather I like the best!

Bird Versus Fish: Pelicans on February 3, 2014

Posted on October 11, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

When Q and I went to visit the pelicans on Sunday, February 2, we didn’t stay long because it was very cold. There was a dead fish bobbing in the water about halfway between the shore and one of the long logs that the pelicans liked to perch on. I call that log the Log of Status. Q was surprised to see the carcass still relatively unmolested: he thought that another bird would have happened upon it and eaten it. “Mother Nature is falling down on her job!” he said. Coots and gulls would occasionally swim over and peck at the fish, but they didn’t seem particularly interested in it.

On Monday the fish was still there. The weather was still very cold, and the light was dim. A few pelicans landed in the bay and swam around for a little while, but the majority of the pelicans were huddled together on logs.

Just as Q and I had seen the day before, a gull and a coot were taking turns half-heartedly pecking at the dead fish.

Suddenly a pelican was flying past the Log of Status and toward the shore. She threw one wing in the air vertically and one wing out horizontally, bracing herself as she skidded to a stop in the very shallow water. Pelicans might land close to shore, but only when there are other pelicans there. This pelican was landing well past the place where the other pelicans were congregating.

Once she recovered from her landing, she began to swim. This was not a leisurely swim; she was going so fast that she was pushing up a wave of water ahead of her body. As I watched, she seemed to keep getting larger and larger. She was swimming straight toward me, toward the shore!

It wasn’t until she leaned down and opened her bill that I realized that she was going for the fish.

She wasn’t exactly trying to scoop up the fish but was instead trying to position herself so that the moving water would float the fish into her pouch. I had to remind myself to keep taking pics and to not just watch. I was very excited. I’d never been so close to a pelican eating a fish.

Suddenly another pelican was steaming toward the first pelican, probably hoping for an opportunity to steal away the fish. The first pelican quickly stuffed all of the fish into her pouch. Only about forty-five seconds had elapsed since I noticed the first bird flying toward the fish.

Pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) with a fish in her gular pouch swimming past another pelican at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Like two ships passing in the night. Except it’s day. And they aren’t ships. And one has a fish and the other doesn’t.

Pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) raising her head to eat a fish in her gular pouch as another pelican swims next to her at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Down the hatch! Eventually.

The first pelican drifted far away, way past the pelicans on the Log of Status. She kept her head tilted in the same position as she floated. The second pelican followed her briefly before getting bored and swimming back to jump onto a log close to the shore. I call that log the Shore Log. After she got on the Shore Log, she worked her way to one side and had a good scratching session.

Another bird jumped onto the log.

She squabbled a bit with the existing pelican, but they both calmed down before any major beaking got going.

Two pelicans (american white pelicans; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) standing together on a log at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Well, I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree, but I really believe that Jean-Luc Picard was the best captain of the Enterprise.

Another pelican joined the two birds on the log, although she did so peacefully.

A pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) standing on a log with her wings outstretched at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

I always liked Captain Janeway.

Close to the Log of Status is a large stump where pelicans like to loaf. These two had fought briefly before settling down. Fighting is very common among the pelicans here, although the birds typically settle down after a few lunges.

Then a very special pelican flew into the bay.

Tagged pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) UT12S21 (S21) standing in water at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

I’M HERE! LET’S GET THIS PARTY STARTED!

I first saw and reported UT12S21 (S21) to the Bird Banding Laboratory on December 11, 2013. She stayed at White Rock Lake until the very end of the season, leaving in the first week of April. She was a first-year pelican originally from the Great Salt Lake, which is pretty incredible—research indicates that North American white pelicans are divided by the Rocky Mountains into two main populations, and migrating pelicans don’t typically cross the mountains. Of course, doing uncommon and courageous things was just part of S21’s style. She had a distinct personality, and I always enjoyed watching her interactions with other pelicans. I was a little disappointed when she joined the others on the Shore Log with no drama.

Then excitement occurred when the next pelican took her turn.

A pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) standing on a log, her wings outstretched, between two more pelicans at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Hi, y’all! What’s going on? Wanna play Scrabble?

A pelican (american white pelican; Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) opens her beak as a threat toward another pelican while standing on a log at at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

FUCK YOU! ALL I WANTED WAS TO PLAY SOME SCRABBLE! HOW DARE YOU SUGGEST HUNGRY HUNGRY HIPPOS!

The new pelican’s aggression was a bluff; she settled in quite nicely with the others.

I can sell you some beautiful land in Florida. Beautiful rolling land. Called Black Creek. You’ve got to act fast, though . . .

A few birds were still coming in, but the birds who were established on the logs were preening or sleeping. My toes were numb and my fingers were cold. I went home to warm up.

Return of the Bald Eagle

Posted on October 4, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

October 3 was a good birding day. As anticipated, the cold front brought over ten new pelicans to White Rock Lake. Almost all of the pelicans, new and old, left their log and swam together in circles around the bay, hunting. While I was chasing them, K texted me and said she was coming down to Sunset Bay—she had the afternoon off. She followed the pelicans with me for a while and then went to the dock. I stayed out a little longer before deciding to go wait on the dock for the pelicans to wind their way back. When I got there, K pointed out across the water and said, “Eagle!”

I followed the direction of K’s finger and saw a large dark bird with a white head standing on one of the far-away logs where the pelicans loaf. She was only there for five minutes before she flew off in the direction of Winfrey Point.

A bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) standing on a log at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

The bald eagle on a log as viewed from the dock at Sunset Bay. She appeared to be eating something. At least here in North Texas I can be reasonably sure she didn’t steal it from an osprey, unlike the bald eagles in Central Florida.

The eagle walked across the log and dropped down into a lower section where we could barely see her unless she lifted her head. I told K that I was going to walk along the shore and find a better place to photograph her.

I was briefly distracted by the pelicans, and when I looked back, the eagle was no longer on her log but flying across the water.

A bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) flying over water at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Wings across the water, heads across the sky.

I arrived at Sunset Bay that afternoon thinking that watching four pelicans land way out by the far-away logs was going to be the only meaningful action of the day. I saw a pelican fishing squad, pelicans dispersing to logs and loafing areas closer to the dock, and a bald eagle.

K was extremely happy that she had visited that afternoon.

How Much Is That Egret in the Window?

Posted on October 3, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Great egrets are all over White Rock Lake. Unlike the cattle and snowy egrets, great egrets stay in North Texas all year. Although they are ubiquitous and kind of boring to me, I have a soft spot for them. I spent a lot of time this spring at the rookery at UT Southwestern, which is predominately populated by great egrets, and when I found an egret that was too young to be on the ground, I would take it to Rogers Wildlife Rehabilitation Center. That was how I learned that frightened egrets attack mammals by stabbing at their eyes.

Great egret (Ardea alba) at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Don’t fuck with me, fellas. I’LL RIP OUT YOUR EYES.

There’s almost always a great egret hunting near the Boathouse, and lately I’ve noticed that one of them has been spending time inside the actual structure of the Boathouse. When I was there this past Tuesday, I managed to get some pics.

Great egret (Ardea alba) inside a boathouse at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Oh, fuck. The big mammal is back.

She tried walking through the Boathouse to change positions and get rid of me. It didn’t work.

You again?

Eventually she seemed resigned to my presence.

She stands in lonely solitude and surveys the sea which leads back, back to where England lies. But she, an exile, may never—

She continued to move around and even tried hunting in a few places, but her efforts were unsuccessful.

Eventually I got tired of watching the egret. It was late afternoon, and I was hot and tired and thirsty. After I crossed the bridge from the Boathouse to get to my car, I looked back and saw that she had moved to a different area inside the building. I trudged back over the bridge just in case her new position yielded anything interesting.

As I went to leave for the second time, I saw a male red-winged blackbird chilling in some reeds. This one stayed on his perch for quite a while. He might have been there for two whole minutes.

Male red-winged blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus) perched on a reed at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

If you want my body, and you think I’m sexy, come on, birdie, let me know.

One last egret pic: when I first got to the Boathouse and was peering in the windows, I saw the egret standing in a dark portion of the building. She looked like she could be a film noir character, a hulking, indistinct figure barely stepping out of deep shadow in a dark alley, and until she speaks you’re not sure if she’s going to threaten to unzip your guts or if she will inadvertently provide you with a clue for the case you’ve been working on.

Maybe I should try to photoshop a fedora and a trenchcoat onto her.

Humans beware: she’s a loner. A rebel. And she’ll stab your eyes out if you give her the chance.

Monarchs Are Still Having Sex

Posted on October 3, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Perhaps I should say that monarchs are still trying to have sex.

After I finished watching the northern shovelers on Tuesday, I went to the Boathouse. Last fall I would see lots of monarchs drinking nectar from blooming plants along the shore there, and during the summer I would frequently see queen butterflies.

A female monarch was feeding not too far from where I was standing. She didn’t fly when I came closer, and she mostly stayed in the same position on her flower.

Female monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) drinking nectar from a flower at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Female monarch, chilling.

Suddenly a male monarch flew near her. I thought he wanted to feed on the same plant and was either going to land near her or attempt to frighten her away and steal her spot. Instead he landed directly on top of her.

A male monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) on top of a female monarch butterfly at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Oh, hello!

He tried crawling down her body—perhaps to assume the position for mating—but the wind kept gusting, and he had difficulty keeping his balance.

This is moving a little quickly for me. Couldn’t we like, have some sodas together first?

YOU COULD AT LEAST ASK ME WHAT MY NAME IS, ASSHOLE.

He was on top of her for one minute. Then he flew away, still clutching her beneath his body. The pair frequently dipped in the air between pauses in his flapping. I followed them, hoping I could get more pics when they landed, but they disappeared up the trunk of a bald cypress tree. Good luck, monarchs!

Some of the fun of watching insects is figuring out what they are later. But sometimes I just can’t find an unambiguous ID. Part of the problem is that I don’t know how to look for points of similarity between my creature and others the way I can for birds, so I look at Google Images and hope to stumble across a pic of an identical creature online. That makes finding an identification for some of my six-legged friends frustrating. Like this wasp.

Agriomyia wasp, aka yellow flower wasp, sips nectar from a flower at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Who are you? Who who, who who?

I’d seen it before, but it never stayed long enough for me to get decent pics. At first I even wondered if it were a fly mimicking a wasp. Now I’m pretty sure that it’s a wasp, but I haven’t found a good ID. I’m tentatively going with Philanthus gibbosus. Maybe someday someone can tell me whether that’s correct.

UPDATE: The wasp has a name! At least a genus name: he is a member of the genus Agriomyia. The common name is apparently “yellow flower wasp.”

I have the right name now! I belong!

Lady Katherine Feeding and a Squabble Between Geese, September 30

Posted on October 2, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Katie, aka Lady Katherine, is a female mute swan that showed up at White Rock Lake a little over a year ago. K didn’t think that the name “Katie” suited the swan, so I suggested that we call her Lady Katherine. She’s a lonely bird; she spent most of last fall and winter following the geese around. She had a sexual relationship with a goose called Patches, although their union was not fruitful. K was extremely disturbed by their coupling, and even I was a little squicked out by the cross-species thing. Of course, if two birds of mature age consent to unconventional sexual practices, who am I to condemn them?

A mute swan (Cygnus olor) forages for food at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Oh my god, Lady Katherine! Have you been foraging near the nuclear power plant?

Now that fall is here, the ganders are ready to start mating. The hens, however, are not as enthusiastic.

Two geese attempt to mate at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sometimes I wonder whether certain gestures that my goose friend Mister Mary Mack performs in front of me are courting signals. If they are, he has been a gentleman about respecting my boundaries. I am not Lady Katherine; I am only interested in mating with my own species.

Katydid at Sunset Bay

Posted on October 1, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Now that I’ve gotten used to searching for bugs, I do it everywhere. That means that when I’m walking around the lake, I’m not looking in front of myself or looking at my feet: I’m looking in the foliage for weird bugs.

During a break between watching the Northern Shoveler Boys at Sunset Bay, I noticed this male katydid perched on a colocasia leaf.

Katydid on a leaf at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Zoinks! Like, let’s get out of here!

He tried to escape by crawling under the leaf.

Katydid, I can still look under the leaf and see you!

Then he seemed to remember that he had wings and flew away.

Juvenile Male Northern Shovelers: First of Season

Posted on October 1, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

I wasn’t expecting much from Sunset Bay this Tuesday–birders are hoping that the next cold front will bring lots of new pelicans, but everything is fairly static for now. There were eleven pelicans hanging out on the far-away logs. Two of them swam in closer to the bay to hunt and bathe but never got close to the dock.

A trio of juvenile blue-winged teals were hanging out on a branch sticking out of the water, and two mallards were dawdling near them. One of the birds turned toward me, and I noticed that it had a seriously fucked-up beak.

Oh wait. Not a mallard. A northern shoveler!

Juvenile male northern shoveler duck (Anas clypeata) at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

“What have you done to his beak?”

At the time I wasn’t sure whether the birds were adult females, juvenile females, or juvenile males, but now I think they are juvenile males.

Two juvenile male northern shoveler ducks (Anas clypeata) swimming at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Bad-ass boys looking for trouble.

They traveled back and forth within a small area until they finally settled down to sleep.

Juvenile male northern shoveler ducks (Anas clypeata) at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

“Look upon my wing, ye Mighty, and despair!”

Suddenly a bunch of ducks and coots ran into the lake from the shore, and the shovelers woke up again and resumed swimming. I, too, continued on my travels.

An Eagle, a Bee, and a DC-3

Posted on September 27, 2014 by pelicansrulegullsdrool

Early last week a bald eagle was sighted at Sunset Bay. She was first observed in the morning on one of the far-away logs that the pelicans favor. She sat out there for a couple of hours before she flew away.

Bald eagles are rare visitors to White Rock Lake. They have only been seen a few times in the past several years, so everyone was excited about the sighting.

Last Wednesday, the 24th, I went out to Sunset Bay to see Mister Mary Mack, my goose friend. I wasn’t thinking of the bald eagle until I walked to the dock and was stopped by two people who said they’d seen a pic of the bald eagle going around and asked where they could see the bird.

I told them that the bald eagle had only been seen the week before for a few hours, and I said that bald eagle sightings at the lake were very uncommon because the birds didn’t stay, just flew overhead or paused before resuming their travels. That sighting was a one-time type of thing, I said.

Ten minutes later a bald eagle flew overhead.

I had been sitting in the shade with Mister Mary Mack when I saw what I thought was a hawk flying over the waters of Sunset Bay. I was slow to get on my feet and get my camera ready because I wasn’t sure if I wanted to take a pic; the hawk was flying extremely high, and taking a blurry, tiny pic wasn’t appealing. As I got ready to photograph the hawk I thought of how BIG she seemed. Then I noticed the white tail. Not a hawk but an eagle! She was only briefly visible and seemed to disappear in the direction of Emerald Isle. She was grasping a fish in her claws; it wasn’t until I looked closely that I realized how large the fish must have been. Eagles are huge birds, and the fish was long enough that it extended well past her legs.

I went back out to the dock a little while later and ran into a birder who had just arrived and hadn’t seen the eagle. He filled me in: apparently the eagle had been seen off and on since the initial two-hour sighting. It wasn’t just passing through.

The bald eagle wasn’t my first sighting; I’d seen plenty when I lived in Florida. It wasn’t even my first Texas sighting; Q and I had seen one on our first trip to the Richland Creek Wildlife Management Area. But there was something thrilling about seeing that bird at the lake where I spend so much time and thus seems ordinary to me.

Now I hope to see an osprey. I used to see them all the time when I lived in Florida, and I miss them.

I moved on the Boathouse. August and September have been very static months for birds here—occasionally I would see a migrant, but mostly it has been mallards and mockingbirds and first-year egrets desperately hunting for fish. So I’ve been spending a lot of time watching insects.

I saw an absolutely beautiful bee with a shiny blue abdomen and pale green eyes. Earlier in the summer green-eyed bees would hang out around the flowers of a Mexican Hat plant I had planted in my front yard, but they were much smaller than the one I saw at the Boathouse. And the Boathouse bee behaved for me: it stayed on each flower for an extended amount of time and climbed onto nearby flowers to feed instead of flitting around. He turned out to be a male southern carpenter bee, Xylocopa micans. He posed for several minutes before flying away.

A male southern carpenter bee, Xylocopa micans, feeding from a flower at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Here he looks like a small child trying to pull himself up to a too-large table.

Q and I occasionally see historical airplanes and helicopters flying over our backyard or the lake as they are in transit to or from places like the Frontiers of Flight museum in Dallas; the Cold War Air Museum in Lancaster; the Cavanaugh Flight Museum in Addison; and the Dallas Executive Airport, where the corporate headquarters are located for the Commemorative Air Force. I know almost nothing about planes, historical or modern, but Q knows plenty and tells me about the ones we see. Q can differentiate between what might be an interesting old plane from a boring modern one by sound. I can’t, so I take pics of almost everything that flies overhead that isn’t a Southwest jet. And something flew overhead.

A DC-3 aircraft, registration number N583V, flies overhead at White Rock Lake in Dallas, TX

Hooray for the DC-3!

When I got home I googled the DC-3’s registration number, N583V, and was able to get quite a bit of information about the plane. She was used initially in America and in England during World War II, then was sold to a Canadian airline.

https://canavbooks.wordpress.com/2013/01/19/where-are-they-now-canadas-enduring-dc-3s/

Apparently she had been sitting fallow for over thirty years before being restored and taking to the air again in 2012.

http://www.warbirdinformationexchange.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=47775

It was a good day to see flying things.

The Pelican Can

If it fits in my pouch, I can eat it!

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