This 12 months, migration appears to have ended a bit sooner than in most earlier years – not very stunning provided that this was the most popular Shanghai Could within the final 100 years, and a minimum of some birds (reminiscent of American Robins – word that these are the pretend robins of the US, they in all probability additionally declare that their title was stolen from them by the liberal press) comply with isotherms on their migration (source).
This leaves Shanghai in June with mainly simply the year-round species and the summer season breeders, perhaps with a number of added ultra-lazy people of migratory species.
Luckily, there are a number of extra such breeding species than most Shanghainese are conscious of. Such because the Black-winged Cuckooshrike.
eBird calls it “an general sooty-colored cuckooshrike”, considerably – however accurately – contradicting the official title.
Whereas the HBW states that it breeds at 300 – 2450 meters, in Shanghai – the place such elevations usually are not accessible outdoors of the higher flooring of some highrises – it makes to with an altitude of about 0 meters as properly.
Within the handbook “The Herons”, the Purple Heron is claimed to have “a snaky neck”, which is an effective description. Right here’s a video.
In case you are the fourth or fifth baby of your dad and mom, you might name your self fortunate to not be a Purple Heron. In a brood, these chicks often don’t survive resulting from sibling rivalry, i.e., they starve (source).
Their migration is kind of quick in comparison with many different bigger birds – in one study, a number of birds flew 4000 km inside 5–7 days whereas one particular person even flew 5600 km continuous.
That signifies that earlier than beginning the migration, the birds spend 15-18 hours per day feeding and fattening up and even transferring their sleeping areas near the meals supply to avoid wasting time (source), equal to a Tour de France bike owner locking himself right into a McDonald’s restaurant for a number of days earlier than beginning the race.
Within the barely frighteningly named journal “Science of The Whole Surroundings”, there’s a paper on organochlorine compounds in Purple Heron eggs nesting in websites positioned round a chloralkali plant (Ebro River). Abstract end result: related chemical compounds emitted by the plant could be discovered within the eggs.
Two different heron species are a lot simpler to see in Shanghai – the Chinese language Pond Heron …
… (a chook that additionally bioaccumulates sure chemical compounds reminiscent of heavy metals, as described here) …
… and the Black-crowned Evening Heron.
Additionally as video.
What to do once you need to develop a container terminal on the location of a giant colony of Black-crowed Evening Herons? Straightforward: You simply transfer the colony (source).
In case you are a younger (second-year) sexy male or feminine Black-crowned Evening Heron searching for an skilled associate to breed, you might be in all probability out of luck. It appears the older herons want to mate with one another, a phenomenon that within the non-pornographic language of ornithologists known as Age-assortative Mating (source).
And what if an evening heron is hungry? One choice is to raid a colony of Widespread Terns and eat their chicks, as described here.
Whereas my recent experimentation with ChatGPT confirmed that ChatGPT thinks the Gray-headed Lapwing could be present in Shanghai’s Century Park, Chongming is a much better place (video).
That features breeding birds, as indicated by the presence of some somewhat cute chicks (video).
The advantage of sure components of Shanghai is that it’s nearly at all times attainable to search out some Reed Parrotbills (although many of the websites I uncover for the species are being destroyed inside a number of months).
So, I can at all times present some images of the species, even when I’ve nothing new to say about them.
Cattle Egrets are completely fashionable birds – they have been among the many first species to ditch mailed letters for faxes, then switched to e-mail early, and now (a minimum of in China) largely talk by WeChat. They’re additionally early adopters with regard to their foraging – these days largely following tractors somewhat than cattle.
It generally seems to be a bit dangerous although.
Additionally accessible as incompetently taken video 1 and video 2.
As administration consultants would phrase it, feminine Pheasant-tailed Jacanas deal with their core competency – laying eggs – and outsource the next steps reminiscent of incubating and feeding the chicks to the males. Environment friendly, but it surely additionally signifies that the feminine chicks lack appropriate function fashions of their adolescence.
The females are larger and – when nests or chicks are attacked – deal with defending in opposition to aerial predators and conspecific females whereas the males deal with different males (source).
Here’s one of many ordinary of my movies exhibiting a Pheasant-tailed Jacana not doing a lot.
Breeding of Black-tailed Godwits appears to be barely negatively affected by highway lighting, as a Dutch study discovered – not an issue on Chongming Island, although.
The species is assessed as Close to Threatened – particularly, numbers within the Netherlands have decreased considerably, and the chicks are negatively affected by intensified agriculture (HBW).
A paper analyzing the unfavorable results of flooding on the breeding success of Black-tailed Godwits is titled “Sink or Swim? Viability of a Black-Tailed Godwit Inhabitants in Relation to Flooding”. It appears the need to create semi-witty titles for scientific papers generally is stronger than advisable.
Anyway, a number of movies present Black-tailed Godwits undoubtedly not sinking: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Azure-winged Magpies are fairly happy with their look …
… and generally intentionally pose subsequent to gadgets that match their very own shade.
The Black-naped Oriole is without doubt one of the most tasty summer season breeders in Shanghai.
With 20 subspecies acknowledged, this species clearly requires a marketing consultant to rationalize the subspecies and cut back them to a extra manageable quantity. I could take over this activity as soon as I’m carried out with eliminating among the underutilized parts from the periodic desk.
Subspecies of Black-naped Orioles can be recognized by their completely different vocalizations, as described in an in any other case frustratingly imprecise paper with statements reminiscent of “The outcomes present {that a} forensic strategy to birdsong evaluation, impressed by speech processing, might provide invaluable insights into cryptic species range in addition to tune identification on the subspecies stage.”
Very doubtless Black Drongos breed in Shanghai as properly.
Whereas there appear to be fewer Lesser Coucals at Nanhui this 12 months, they nonetheless have a robust presence at Fengxian. Sadly, that space can be presently being destroyed.
Bye, bye, Lesser Coucal.
Some researchers did an experiment that amongst people is just carried out not often and solely by way of errors made in maternity hospitals. They switched eggs between Pink-rumped Swallows and Barn Swallows. Much like the uncommon human experiment, the outcomes have been usually acceptable, although after all that doesn’t account for any potential psychological harm attributable to the change in dad and mom.
Sometimes, second-hand nests of Pink-rumped Swallows flip up in native actual property markets. Whereas the demand usually is pretty low, some home sparrows generally use this chance to get onto what’s presumably the bottom stage of the property ladder (source).
As a toddler, I as soon as had an aquarium with a number of black mollies. Thus, it was a bit disappointing that the complete textual content of a paper titled “Escape Response of Black Mollies (Poecilia sphenops) to Predatory Dives of a Pied Kingfisher (Ceryle rudis)” isn’t freely accessible on-line.
One other paper additionally seems to be on the interplay between Pied Kingfishers and fish: “Results of Nile perch (Lates niloticus) introduction into Lake Victoria, East Africa, on the eating regimen of Pied Kingfishers (Ceryle rudis)”. In essence, the introduction of the Nile perch decreased the fish species ideally eaten by the kingfishers, forcing them to eat extra of a smaller fish species. Extra work, much less enjoyable, all as a result of people launched some silly fish into kingfisher habitat. People are in all probability not very fashionable amongst these kingfishers.
Widespread Kingfishers are a great match with my restricted video expertise, as they often simply sit round ready for one thing to occur (not “Waiting around to die“, however it’s at all times good to call a Townes van Zandt tune).
That’s in distinction to Black-winged Stilts, which appear very eager on showing off their (admittedly spectacular) legs.
Whiskered Terns look very very similar to they use lipstick. Unusual.
One study discovered that in Whiskered Terns, “Females make investments a lot much less in parental care than males, offering much less meals [to the chicks] and deserting [the chicks] extra often”. I suppose the females simply attempt to keep away from typical feminine cliches.
Gray Treepies are comparatively uncommon in Shanghai – distribution maps point out that that is just about the Northern border of their vary, and even barely past that.
In accordance with wordsense, the “pie” within the treepie (and in addition in magpie) is similar because the one in “having your pie and consuming it too”. The web site claims that pie originates from Center English pie (pye), which in flip in all probability comes from Latin pica (“magpie, jay”) – with the concept that the numerous components put into pies are comparable with the truth that magpies will eat nearly something. Sounds a bit made-up to me, however after all, it might take me a while to provide you with a greater made-up clarification, so let’s simply take this one.
And at last, round this time of the 12 months, grownup Pink-billed Starlings are always harassed by their hungry chicks, serving as a helpful warning to people to make use of contraception.
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