FOAM LAKE BIRDING
No. 184
We are in that time of year that I refer to as the
"doldrums of birding". The
summer residents and most of the transients are gone south; the winter birds
have not moved here yet; even permanent residents like woodpeckers and nuthatches
have not left the rural areas and moved into towns which they will soon
do. So for the time being, it is
Chickadees, House Sparrows, the odd Junco, a pair of Eurasian Collared Doves
and a very confused and very dead Ruffed Grouse.
The Ruffed Grouse is our only woodland "wild chicken"
as it were (see Art. No. 96). Once in a
while in the fall they invade urban areas where they seem to pick up a bad case
of "stupid" for lack of a better term. Here they become very tame to the point they
have to be shooed away otherwise they just stand there and look at you with a
blank look in their eyes. Years back
when we lived in Wishart, one fall when there was snow on the ground, a Ruffed
Grouse stood in our doorstep and would not let our girls into the house when
they came home from school. I had to
chase the grouse away. It moved to the
backyard to our patio and spent the next three weeks or so sleeping right up
against the glass patio door every night.
During this same period one of our neighbours had a grouse fly right
through her living room picture window.
When the startled neighbour came to the living room to investigate there
was the dying grouse in the middle of the floor amid all kinds of glass. Almost the same thing happened to me several
weeks ago. I was working at the dining
room table and looked up just in time to see a very large bird come barrelling
straight at me. It hit the window with a
tremendous wallop startling everybody in the house especially me. Fortunately, the window did not break but sadly
the grouse was killed instantly. Theories
abound as to why this happens but the most plausible is that when there is a
very successful hatch the young have to disperse and there is really no place
for them to go so they head for the towns. Being young and not very wise they end up in
places unfamiliar to them causing harm to themselves and town residents alike.
A much more pleasant event is the daily visitation of a
pair of Eurasian Collared Doves (see Art. No. 50). They started coming to our yard to the bird
baths for drinking water and have continued to do so even though the cold
weather has frozen the water. It is nice
to see them walking around in the yard looking for something to eat.
The Eurasian Collared Dove is an invasive species from
Europe that was successfully introduced into the West Indies from where it flew
across to Florida
and has spread throughout most of the continent. It is now here. It is quite similar to the native Mourning
Dove but can be quite easily distinguished from it by the thin black collar on
the back of the neck. Unlike the
Mourning Dove the Eurasian Collared Dove is not migratory and can be expected
here all year round.
There is some confusion as to where the Ringed Turtle
Dove fits in to all this. Older bird
books do list it as a distinct species but without much explanation. Here is the whole scoop as I understand
it. There are only two species of
Collared Doves: the Eurasian and African.
They are closely related and very similar to one another with the
African being slightly smaller and much paler.
Furthermore, when vocalizing the African has a two note song while the
Eurasian has a three note sound. The
Ringed Turtle Dove is nothing more than the domestic version of the African
Collared Dove and escaped or released birds have not succeeded in the
wild. At present the name "Ringed
Turtle Dove" has been discontinued by ornithologists and replaced by the
original "African Collared Dove".
This week's pictures of the Eurasian Collared Dove were
taken in our backyard this spring.
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