Bluebird Days Ahead
Phil Taunton
Friday, March 2, 2007
What a fickle woman Mother Nature is. Couldn’t you just feel it?
Spring seemed just around the corner on Wednesday until ominous clouds started developing in the south. Rain — along with a pounding hail — came that night, and Thursday’s snow brought the reality of winter back home.
March Madness doesn’t concern just basketball. Hopefully what came in like a lion will live up to the verse and go out like a lamb.
Spring bulbs and perennial flowers are breaking through the ground. Trees are budding. Early every morning while I am in the garage putting on my work boots, I listen to the Carolina Wren’s, “tea-kettle, tea-kettle, tea-kettle” — singing one of the loudest songs considering the size of bird — and Cardinals announce the morn.
Before long, robins, and hopefully within a month, purple martins will join the welcoming day chorus.
Wednesday’s shirt-sleeve weather had Wifeus and me out on the links with birdies in our mind. Hers were the kind related to golf that makes a duffer smile with accomplishment once the shot is holed.
I was more interested in just being with her before she migrates to her summer range, and also in the bluebird trail we maintain on the golf course.
Now is the time to erect new boxes and to repair and clean out old ones. Since my golf game involves being in the rough quite a bit, maintaining bluebird houses while I try to play the addictive game is a natural fit.
Eastern bluebirds, not to be confused with blue jays, mind you, are a brilliant blue with an orange-red breast. Female bluebirds are a bit duller in color than the male.
Bluebirds are cavity-dwelling birds and were once in decline because of the loss of natural nesting holes, increased pesticide use and competition with birds like the house sparrow and European starling.
If you decide to put up a bluebird house, please maintain and monitor it on a regular basis. House sparrows and starlings should always be discouraged from using the bluebird box. Check the boxes once a week and remove the nest of any unwanted tenants immediately.
Bluebirds don’t mind the attention you give them. If you surprise them on the nest, they will return to the box.
Bluebird boxes might be used by other native species, such as house wrens, not to be confused with the Carolina — which would rather use a flower pot — chickadees, nuthatches, tufted titmice and tree swallows. A pair of Least Flycatchers raised a brood in one of our boxes last year.
Because bluebirds feed primarily on insects caught in relatively short grass, boxes should be placed near pastures, hayfields and meadows (bluebirds will not nest in heavily wooded areas). Boxes should be placed about 100 yards or more apart, because the birds are territorial.
Rural by nature, bluebirds seldom nest near towns or houses. You should mount your boxes about 4 to 6 feet off the ground on a metal pole or fence post.
Some bluebirds stay around all year. While I was hunting, I saw bluebirds off and on. Their melodic song always brings a smile to my face.
They have made a comeback in part by bird fanciers maintaining houses for them. Bluebirds can be early nesters, and breeding pairs will be looking for nesting houses any day now.
Nature’s notes
I have received reports that some American Goldfinch, also know as wild canaries, have migrated back to our area and are showing up at the feeders.
These birds are really resident here, year around. What you are now seeing are males beginning to molt into their flashy golden-yellow breeding plumage.
In late fall and winter, they resemble the females once again. All birds molt, some as many as three and occasionally four times a year.
The Rock Ptarmigan, a bird of the Tundra, molts to a solid white once winter sets in so it blends in with its surroundings. They are a barred grayish brown in the summer.
It also has been reported that a few walleye are being caught.
Ice out has occurred on most of the lakes, and the key to when they become active is water temperature. Most Kansas lakes are 37 or 38 degrees now. Walleye will begin moving to their spawning grounds when the temperature nears 45 degrees.