The human trait of prejudice - in birds?

Here in Texas, I am extremely lucky to have the Starship parked right next to a huge Texas cedar. They really are a juniper (Ashe), but have always been known as a Texas or mountain cedar. It is a female and laden with many thousands of purple bitter sweet berries.

The immediate area has been claimed by a mockingbird who mercilessly attacks every robin that invades the restricted territory which he has staked out as his own individual domain. Mockingbirds are the state bird of Texas and thier belligerency is well known, including attacks on rattlesnakes!

Hundreds of robins are trying to feed on the juniper berries, and the mockingbird relentlessly chases them all away. I find the behavior unusual as there are more berries than any one bird can eat. Also strange is that the mockingbird will allow some other birds to have a free meal at his cedar diner, but no robins allowed!

Is this prejudice or profiling showing its ugly head in the avairy world? I don't think so. The more I watch them, it appears allowed birds are smaller, maybe the threat assessment is less compared to the thick bellied robins who are more his size. What do you think?

Pictured are juniper berries, mockingbird, robin, cedar waxwing, and a cute yellow rumped warbler.

Snow is gone! - German Friends - Costa Rica

2/15/10 The snow is all melted, and today thousands of female robins are migrating thru north Texas. (15 days after the males passed by)

Here is a email from my friends Bernd & Margitta. Bernd is an excellent photographer and these are his pictures from Costa Rica. The bridge to Panama looks pretty scary to me! Don't feel too sad for the broken truck, it is now all repaired and running fine. (see earlier posts)

Hi Paul,

super, that you had such a good week with your son John. We wish you also much fun with the amphicar and all the time with Gayla – our greetings are for Gayla too.

Sorry that I answer so late. We were a long time on “primitive Campgrounds” without electricity and Internet.

After Key West we spend some days again in the Everglades Nationalpark. Then we drove to the Lake Okeechobe for some days.

The next destination was near Sebastian on the East-Coast. That was a very nice place (also for you, for boats, fishing, Spanky), it was called Long Point Campground North of the State Park Sebastian Inlet (that was full – here are so many snowbirds, all places on Stateparks must be reserved 11 month in advance told me the ranger).

On Long Point we spent a nice week with sunshine and a very friendly american neighbour “Scott” with 2 beautiful dogs.

After that time we went to Cape Canaveral. Bernd wanted to see the Kennedy Space Center. And we were very lucky there, because we have seen the start of a Space Shuttle. The first morning it has been cancelled (the weather was to cloudy), but on Monday morning at 4.15 we have seen it (we were the night on the side of the A1A at Banana River. Really a good spot to see the Start.) We also visited Disney World in Orlando and now we are on Flagler Beach north of Daytona.

Our ship started probably the 25th of March in Baltimore and then it’s time to say “Goodbye America”. We will take a flight this time, because this ship doesn’t allow passengers on board. So we went now every day a little bit more NORTH, even if the weather is not so funny there.

The new pictures are not ready for E-Mail. So I send you some of Costa Rica again.

You can see one of a boat-trip in the Mangrove-Forest, one of the beach of Samara with wild horses. The next is the bridge between Costa Rica and Panama. This bridge is the border. It is very narrow but not one way. You must take care, that no other truck or car is coming. To go backwards is really dangerous.

The last picture is our poor truck after the engine breakdown in Costa Rica. You see, even the monkeys look very sad, when they see this trouble.

Many greeting for you and Gayla and a little Hug for Spanky.

Blizzards of 2010 - Dallas Snowstorm

It is official - 12.5 inches of snow at DFW airport, the greatest single event snow ever!

( in 111 years of record keeping). Texas weathermen completely missed this one, all the fancy computer models did not see this event happening.

Amazingly, it did not shut down the highway system. Minor accidents of course, but helped by many people staying home, and all school systems are closed. There are about 175,000 folks out of power.

It is a very heavy snow so there are problems with roofs collapsing and fires from sparking downed power lines. I watched the other blizzards across the country this year, but thought I would dodge the bullet here in Texas. Ha!

The great news is this is Texas, this will all be just a memory in a few days. I hope the thousands of migrating Robins that passed through last week found a good place to hide out!

Birds in Texas - February Robins

When I was a young boy growing up in Michigan, all my family members competed to be the one to see the first Robin arrive! Dad was usually the winner and he with excitement would share that first sighting with us! We all knew spring was just around the corner, and after a typical long northern winter, we were all ready for it!

Here in Texas, everything of course is done on a grand scale. Today there are literally thousands of Robins just arrived here in north Texas. Every tree is packed with them and their combined voices are extremely vocal.

This is the beginning of their migration from south Texas back to their summer homes farther north. These are the males, spotted by thier bright orange breasts and dark feathers, who move in advance of the females.

So, If you are stuck in the north and truly tired of winter by now, take hope, the robins are on the way! They fly about 30 miles per hour when migrating and move depending on temperature and food supply. My guess for a Michigan first sighting this year is March 13th. Let me know how close my guess was when you see one!

Texas is such a great place for birding, the last three photos are of other attractive birds I have seen here this year.