Bird behaviour never ceases to fascinate me.
I heard an amazing story from a Smithers man (Gerry Vandergaag) who told me about how, when he was camping this year at Congdon campsite on the shore of Kluane Lake in the Yukon, he was lucky to observe and photograph a pair of Yellow-shafted Flickers ‘moving house.’
Both the male and female adults each alternately disappeared into their nest cavity and very carefully picked up and carried 4 eggs and 3 hatched chicks – one at a time – out of the nest and flew off with them – presumably to a new nest cavity somewhere nearby.
Gerry was curious if anyone had reported this before. I had not heard about this, but my immediate reaction was that something (probably a predator) had discovered the nest and the adults felt it was no longer a safe place to raise their family.
I checked online but could not find anything specific about Flickers moving their eggs and chicks, but such evacuations have been reported for a variety of other birds – usually either when a predator has discovered the nest or there was damage to the nest tree.
A big thank you to Gerry for allowing me to show you his beautiful photo(s) and to tell you this wonderful story.
Also, a friend called to tell me she had watched a pair of hairy woodpeckers coming to a local hummingbird feeder. The female came in and took a good sip of the nectar and then flew over to a nearby tree where she fed her begging, fledged child. Talk about high-energy fast food.
The male also went to the feeder for a drink. Landing on a hummingbird feeder is problematic for woodpeckers because they are designed to stick out their feet first so they can grab the vertical side of tree trunks. As a result, they tend to land on the hummer feeder almost hanging underneath with their grasp slipping as they reach upwards and around to stick their beak (tongues) into the openings.
Both the adults have been spoiled by the owner of the feeder who built a special landing perch for them to hang onto as they feed.
The use of hummingbird feeders by other birds seems to be becoming more and more frequent as they watch the hummers and imitate them.
One warm evening as I was trying to find out what was upsetting the robins and lots of other small birds, all making quite a racket, I suddenly realized that I was also hearing the unmistakable, rasping, nasal repeated BEEErzh of a male territorial common nighthawk flying over.
They are not heard often here but do like to nest in openings and recent cut blocks around Smithers and in the Kispiox Valley. I never did find out what was bothering the other birds, but it was not the insectivorous nighthawk.
