Hot & Smoky!

This week temperatures soared into the high 90's, and stayed there for several days! It was so HOT, but it cooled down to the mid 80's yesterday! We also had smoke from the Lake Berryessa Fire, filling up the No.Yuba River Canyon. Luckily the smoke comes and goes, depending on the wind direction. The river is super low already, but not slimey. It's the perfect temperature for swimming, and swim we did! We went in every day this week! Surprisingly, today is overcast and we even got a few sprinkles of rain! Starting tomorrow it's supposed to heat up to the high 80's again. Hopefully, cooler temps and a "chance of showers" will be in the not too distant forecasts. The worry of forest fires is ever present at this time of year.

Left: Hairy Woodpecker(adult male) - Right: Hairy Woodpeckers(adults:female & male)

Picoides villosus

Woodpeckers!

I found a newly occupied bird nest this week!  It's a Hairy Woodpecker nest in a telephone pole, just down the road from our house!  I've been watching the male and female taking turns going in and out of the nest cavity!  In the photo above right, the female is waiting on the left side of the telephone pole and the male is emerging from the nest cavity on the right side!!  Wow!  

Hairy Woodpeckers live here year round, and I have found two other nest sites in previous summers.  This is the first one I've found in a telephone pole, although a lot of the local telephone poles have several old nest holes.  

Insects make up 75% of a Hairy Woodpeckers diet!  They mainly eat wood-boring beetle and bark beetle larvae, as well as moth larvae in their cocoons.  They will also eat ants, spiders, centipedes, millipedes, aphids, pine seeds, berries, and fruits.  They prefer to nest in dead trees, or large branches, with rotten cores.  Both the male and female excavate the nest cavity, which can be from 8" to 12" deep!  The female lays 3-6 eggs, which the male and female incubate for 11-12 days.  The nesting period for their precocial chicks, which are born without downy feathers, is 28-30 days.  The male and female both feed the nestlings regurgitated food. After fledging, the parents will continue feeding their young for another 3-4 weeks.  During this whole process, the entire family sleeps together in the nest cavity at night!!  I'll keep watching, and hopefully see some fledglings soon!

Hairy Woodpecker (immature male) - Picoides villosus

In the photos directly above, an immature male is looking for bugs in the holes of a different telephone pole!  An immature male has a red crown, whereas an adult male has a red patch on the back of its head.  Compare the red head feathers of this immature male with the red head feathers of the mature male (above) that is peeking out of the nest hole.  Female Hairy Woodpeckers (insert above) do not have any red feathers.

Red-breasted Sapsuckers - Sphyrapicus ruber

Sapsuckers!

I've seen several Red-breasted Sapsuckers in my neighborhood this week!  They've been hammering on telephone polls, announcing their presence!  I haven't located their nests, but they do seem pretty busy!  I'll try to find a nest this week!

Male and female Red-breasted Sapsuckers have identical plumage.  Their main food is tree sap, but they also hawk insects out of the air and pry them from tree bark.  To obtain sap, they will drill horizontal, parallel rows of shallow small "wells" in the bark of a tree, preferrably an apple tree, and eat the sap as well as the insects that get stuck in the sap!   Adults are monogamous in the breeding/nesting season.  Both sexes share in the excavation of the nest, usually 7"-9" deep, as well as the incubation (11-14 days) and care of nestlings (23-28 days).  The male sleeps in the nest cavity at night, until the nestlings fledge.  After fledging occurs, the adult male will roost outside at night.  The female always roosts outside on a tree trunk at night, usually under the base of a limb. The nestlings are born altricial and are nidicolous, or raised in a nest and dependent upon parents for a period of time!  Once the nestlings fledge, the parents continue to feed them and/or lead them to sap wells, for about a week.  The fledglings are usually capable of feeding themselves within a few days.

Red-breasted Sapsuckers - Picoides villosus

Adult Flycatcher with fledgling (sp?)

Baby Birds!

Baby birds are still being fed in our neighborhood!  I saw the Flycatchers (above) way up high on a dead cedar branch.  The little one would flap its wings and open its beak to be fed!  It was SO cute!  There was another pair of Flycatchers up in the same tree, but I didn't see anymore babies.  I don't know what species of Flycatcher this is, they are pretty difficult to identify!

I also hear the demanding calls of the Black-headed Grosbeak fledglings (below left) all day long, down by our bird feeders.  I even watched a female feed this little fledgling!  The hummingbird population has also recently increased at our feeders! The new hummers don't have much metallic coloring, so I'm assuming they're young ones.  They aren't being fed by their parents, so their officially called "juveniles".   They are so tiny, it's amazing they can survive in the wild!  I love watching all these baby birds!

    

 Black-headed Grosbeak (fledgling)  -  Anna's Hummingbird (juvenile)

       Pheucticus melanocephalus - Calypte anna    

Bullock's Orioles - Icterus bullockii

male - female - female's tail sticking out of the nest

Bullock's Oriole Update!

The female Bullock's Oriole is incubating her eggs!  She and the first-year male are still flying around together.  I noticed that she doesn't call that often anymore, perhaps to keep the location of her nest a secret!  I'm so happy she is nesting!  I can't wait for the eggs to hatch in a week or so!

Leopard Lilies - Lilium pardalinum

An Abundance of Wildflowers!

If you've never walked through the Aspen Grove in the Lakes Basin Campground, now is the time to do it!  There are so many wildflowers in bloom!  This year there are more Leopard Lilies than I have ever seen before, as well as Rein Orchids, Monkshoods, and Corn Lilies!  I spent a couple of hours, just in the Aspen Grove, photographing flowers.  It was incredibly beautiful!  A riotous tangle of blossoms!

 Rein Orchids - Plantanthera leucostachys  -  Leopard Lily - Lilium pardalinum

The word "pardalinum" means "leopard like".  An easy way to remember that they are not Tiger Lilies is that "leopards have spots, and tigers have stripes".

    Vireo sp.(?)                    Lincoln's Sparrow(?) - Melospiza lincolnii (?)

These little birds (above) came down from the tree tops and checked me out while I was photographing in the Aspen Grove.  I'm not sure what they are, but will ask some friends for help.  Check back next week for their correct ID's and more!

Who made these conical pits?

Is this bird a woodpecker?

Where are the reptiles, amphibians, and bears?

Check back next week for the answers to these questions and more!

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