Google Alerts tipped me off to a mention of SABO in a post over at sustainablog.org. Checking it out, I discovered that contributor Justin Van Kleeck repeated my quote from Mike Klesius's January 2007 National Geographic article on hummingbirds. Scrolling down, I was even more delighted to see that the first comment paraphrased one of Tom's favorite observations about hummingbirds as quoted by Richard Conniff in "So tiny, so sweet--so mean," an article originally published in Smithsonian Magazine (September 2000) and condensed and reprinted by Reader's Digest (May 2001).
You can read the Nat Geo article here, but I couldn't find the full Smithsonian article on line. Too bad, since it earned author Richard Conniff the John Burroughs Association essay award for 2000. You can read part of it here. (This should come as no surprise, but I was the other guide Conniff quoted in his opening paragraphs.) --SW
Monday, June 23, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Kiss kiss, bang bang
Mid-June is a perfect time for this Zooillogix post on kissing bugs. These stealthy stowaways emerge each summer from our local White-throated Woodrat (pack rat) nests (of which there's one under our bathroom floor) to invade southern Arizona homes in search of fresh blood.
Kissing bugs (genus Triatoma) are on a very short list of invertebrates that we terminate with extreme prejudice whenever and wherever they're encountered. Even bark scorpions get a pass if we find them in remote parts of the yard, but kissing bugs always get swatted, stomped, or crushed in a handy paper towel. And we do keep those paper towels handy, because offing them can be a thoroughly disgusting experience. Even if they're not bloated from a recent blood meal, they produce a powerful defensive stink like other members of their suborder, Heteroptera. You do NOT want to get that nauseating reek on your skin or clothes. There are three species in southern Arizona, but I never pause long enough to key them out before sending them to that Great Pack Rat Midden in the Sky.
They're active mainly at night and often bite sleeping humans on or near the mouth (hence the name). The bite is virtually painless but can cause severe allergic reactions, and droppings shed at the scene of the crime can contaminate the wound with the trypanosomes that cause Chagas disease, a mainly tropical infection that kills thousands of people in Latin America every year. Though the most effective vectors for the disease seem to be South America species of Triatoma, there have been a handful of recent cases in the southern U.S. The organism gets concentrated in the bugs' feces; in fact, the traditional method to test for Chagas is to let fresh, uninfected kissing bugs bite the patient, then check the bugs' droppings for the trypanosome. Chagas has even been suggested as a contributor to Charles Darwin's chronic health problems.
These nasty bloodsuckers are macabre harbingers of our late summer "monsoon." The increase in heat and humidity really seems to bring them out, so it's no surprise that in the last 36 hours we encountered the first two kissing bugs of the season inside the house. The first landed right in front of me on my drawing board at about midnight; the second casually waddled out from under our claw-foot bathtub this morning. Only the second had dined recently, though three or four itchy, swollen spots on my feet suggest that the first had already partaken of my juiciness and was looking for a refill.
CRAP! Make that three--one just came buzzing in to land on the computer hutch while I was typing. Thank goodness they're such clumsy fliers, but now I'm paranoid about how many might be sneaking around under the desk, waiting for me to put my juicy toes back on the floor. *shudder*
Because I refuse to let one live long enough to photograph it intact, here are a bunch of pix from Bug Guide: Genus Triatoma
And here's a whole bunch of skin-crawlingly fascinating information from the University of Arizona: The Kissing Bug Project
--SW
Update: By 11:30 p.m. the body count for the season was up to four--not a good sign, since we rarely find more than a dozen in the house per summer. It wasn't easy getting to sleep, listening for the dry buzz of wings and hard little thop of another six-legged vampire homing in on its prey.
Kissing bugs (genus Triatoma) are on a very short list of invertebrates that we terminate with extreme prejudice whenever and wherever they're encountered. Even bark scorpions get a pass if we find them in remote parts of the yard, but kissing bugs always get swatted, stomped, or crushed in a handy paper towel. And we do keep those paper towels handy, because offing them can be a thoroughly disgusting experience. Even if they're not bloated from a recent blood meal, they produce a powerful defensive stink like other members of their suborder, Heteroptera. You do NOT want to get that nauseating reek on your skin or clothes. There are three species in southern Arizona, but I never pause long enough to key them out before sending them to that Great Pack Rat Midden in the Sky.
They're active mainly at night and often bite sleeping humans on or near the mouth (hence the name). The bite is virtually painless but can cause severe allergic reactions, and droppings shed at the scene of the crime can contaminate the wound with the trypanosomes that cause Chagas disease, a mainly tropical infection that kills thousands of people in Latin America every year. Though the most effective vectors for the disease seem to be South America species of Triatoma, there have been a handful of recent cases in the southern U.S. The organism gets concentrated in the bugs' feces; in fact, the traditional method to test for Chagas is to let fresh, uninfected kissing bugs bite the patient, then check the bugs' droppings for the trypanosome. Chagas has even been suggested as a contributor to Charles Darwin's chronic health problems.
These nasty bloodsuckers are macabre harbingers of our late summer "monsoon." The increase in heat and humidity really seems to bring them out, so it's no surprise that in the last 36 hours we encountered the first two kissing bugs of the season inside the house. The first landed right in front of me on my drawing board at about midnight; the second casually waddled out from under our claw-foot bathtub this morning. Only the second had dined recently, though three or four itchy, swollen spots on my feet suggest that the first had already partaken of my juiciness and was looking for a refill.
CRAP! Make that three--one just came buzzing in to land on the computer hutch while I was typing. Thank goodness they're such clumsy fliers, but now I'm paranoid about how many might be sneaking around under the desk, waiting for me to put my juicy toes back on the floor. *shudder*
Because I refuse to let one live long enough to photograph it intact, here are a bunch of pix from Bug Guide: Genus Triatoma
And here's a whole bunch of skin-crawlingly fascinating information from the University of Arizona: The Kissing Bug Project
--SW
Update: By 11:30 p.m. the body count for the season was up to four--not a good sign, since we rarely find more than a dozen in the house per summer. It wasn't easy getting to sleep, listening for the dry buzz of wings and hard little thop of another six-legged vampire homing in on its prey.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Heavy weather
We've just endured a wretched three days here in beautiful southeastern Arizona. A fierce low pressure system brought savage winds, rain, sleet, hail, and snow to our little corner of paradise. The winds started when temperatures were running slightly above normal (hot, in other words) and humidities very low, which played heck with tender young leaves. Gusts up to 58 mph were recorded at the Bisbee-Douglas airport, and a substantial portion of our roof is scattered over our yard and neighboring properties. Our newly planted vegetables and many of our flowers look like they've been sandblasted.
Then on Wednesday night the temperatures took a nosedive. Thursday morning's bird walk in Miller Canyon was seriously chilly, but there was lots of activity as tired, hungry birds tried to recover from the wind and cold, and the deep canyon protected us from the winds. I felt especially bad for the Spotted Owl family 50+ feet up in a huge fir -- their nest was swaying so much that they could have used scopolamine patches. (I so wish I'd had a digiscoping camera to capture the fuzzy little face poking our from under its mama's wing.) Back at Beatty's Guest Ranch, hungry hungry hummingbirds, including two White-eareds and aLucifer x Calypte hybrid, put on quite a show. [Subsequent observations revealed this bird to be a Lucifer-like hybrid, probably Broad-tailed x Costa's.]
The winds raged on through Thursday night, the staccato beat of rain, sleet, and hail against our bedroom window making it hard to sleep. It dried out a bit yesterday morning, but the cold, gusty conditions continued through the afternoon and into the night. As we made our way to yesterday afternoon's hummingbird banding session in Carr Canyon, the peaks of the Huachuca Mountains were thickly capped with snow, something we've never seen this late in the season in our 20 years in Arizona. Our banding crew was bundled up like Inuits except for me -- my burliest turtleneck sweater and woolly socks weren't quite warm enough, so I ended up borrowing a jacket from one of the volunteers. The weather had the birds in a much less cooperative mood than usual, but gentle application of warm breath seemed to calm them down. A male Broad-billed, two male Magnificents, two female Anna's, a female Black-chinned, and a premature escapee male Blue-throated were our rewards for soldiering through.
At least the storm brought some precipitation, which should compensate a bit for the destructiveness of the winds and cold. I'm expecting to see a renewal of nesting activity over the next week or so as birds that lost their eggs and nestlings start from scratch. A pair of Greater Roadrunners in lower Carr Canyon seemed to be getting a head start yesterday afternoon--mating just yards from the road and totally unfazed when two carloads of bird banders pulled up to gawk at them! --SW
Then on Wednesday night the temperatures took a nosedive. Thursday morning's bird walk in Miller Canyon was seriously chilly, but there was lots of activity as tired, hungry birds tried to recover from the wind and cold, and the deep canyon protected us from the winds. I felt especially bad for the Spotted Owl family 50+ feet up in a huge fir -- their nest was swaying so much that they could have used scopolamine patches. (I so wish I'd had a digiscoping camera to capture the fuzzy little face poking our from under its mama's wing.) Back at Beatty's Guest Ranch, hungry hungry hummingbirds, including two White-eareds and a
The winds raged on through Thursday night, the staccato beat of rain, sleet, and hail against our bedroom window making it hard to sleep. It dried out a bit yesterday morning, but the cold, gusty conditions continued through the afternoon and into the night. As we made our way to yesterday afternoon's hummingbird banding session in Carr Canyon, the peaks of the Huachuca Mountains were thickly capped with snow, something we've never seen this late in the season in our 20 years in Arizona. Our banding crew was bundled up like Inuits except for me -- my burliest turtleneck sweater and woolly socks weren't quite warm enough, so I ended up borrowing a jacket from one of the volunteers. The weather had the birds in a much less cooperative mood than usual, but gentle application of warm breath seemed to calm them down. A male Broad-billed, two male Magnificents, two female Anna's, a female Black-chinned, and a premature escapee male Blue-throated were our rewards for soldiering through.
At least the storm brought some precipitation, which should compensate a bit for the destructiveness of the winds and cold. I'm expecting to see a renewal of nesting activity over the next week or so as birds that lost their eggs and nestlings start from scratch. A pair of Greater Roadrunners in lower Carr Canyon seemed to be getting a head start yesterday afternoon--mating just yards from the road and totally unfazed when two carloads of bird banders pulled up to gawk at them! --SW
Friday, February 22, 2008
Treasures of the Sierra Madre: Las Guacamayas
One of the advantages to living on the Mexican border is that we occasionally get to cross it. Our latest favorite destination is Madera, Chihuahua, home of the world's largest remaining flock of endangered Thick-billed Parrots.
I first visited Madera in September 2002 at the invitation of colleague Noel Snyder, who was a major player in the ultimately unsuccessful attempt to reintroduce the species into Arizona. When I got home, Tom asked, "So, how was the trip?" I replied by showing him dozens of photos of parrots, nesting Eared Quetzals, and much more. His next words, once he caught his breath, were, "When do we leave?" Two weeks later we were back in Madera and already planning tours through SABO with the parrots and Eared Quetzals ("Ps & Qs") as the headliners.
One of our traveling companions on last July's tour was conservation biologist, author, and Princeton University professor David S. Wilcove (fourth from the right in the photo at left). David's encounters with the guacamayas, as Aldo Leopold called them, inspired him to write a thoughful article on the species' past, present, and future for the Winter 2008 issue of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's magazine, Living Bird.
The best news in this article for the parrots and those of us who love them is that the American Bird Conservancy and ProNatura have been hard at work negotiating protection for their most important nesting areas. With on-the-ground conservation efforts and the added economic incentives of ecotourism, there may hope for the future of these gaudy, raucous treasures of the Sierra Madre. --SW
I first visited Madera in September 2002 at the invitation of colleague Noel Snyder, who was a major player in the ultimately unsuccessful attempt to reintroduce the species into Arizona. When I got home, Tom asked, "So, how was the trip?" I replied by showing him dozens of photos of parrots, nesting Eared Quetzals, and much more. His next words, once he caught his breath, were, "When do we leave?" Two weeks later we were back in Madera and already planning tours through SABO with the parrots and Eared Quetzals ("Ps & Qs") as the headliners.
One of our traveling companions on last July's tour was conservation biologist, author, and Princeton University professor David S. Wilcove (fourth from the right in the photo at left). David's encounters with the guacamayas, as Aldo Leopold called them, inspired him to write a thoughful article on the species' past, present, and future for the Winter 2008 issue of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's magazine, Living Bird.The best news in this article for the parrots and those of us who love them is that the American Bird Conservancy and ProNatura have been hard at work negotiating protection for their most important nesting areas. With on-the-ground conservation efforts and the added economic incentives of ecotourism, there may hope for the future of these gaudy, raucous treasures of the Sierra Madre. --SW
Re: Verse
In case you missed it, closet poet Tom won WildBird On The Fly's limerick contest with this evocative bit of bird verse:
A marvelous bird is the Dipper
He swims under water like Flipper
Like a little gray Robin
His rear end a-bobbin'
He seems to be feeling quite chipper.
--SW
He swims under water like Flipper
Like a little gray Robin
His rear end a-bobbin'
He seems to be feeling quite chipper.
--SW
Monday, February 04, 2008
Art with heart
Congratulations to our friend and fellow Arizona birder Anne Peyton, who's been honored as Conservation Artist for February 2008 by Artists for Conservation for "artistic excellence and extraordinary dedication to conservation." We couldn't agree more!
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