As it becomes late in the season, the sparrow activity quiets down a lot. The birds aren’t singing late in the day, there aren’t as many nests to find, and the sparrows are just more difficult to find in general-- except for the juveniles. We have started to see flocks of juveniles flying around and [...]
While we at Ecostudies Institute primarily work on birds, I had the opportunity to attend a week-long workshop about the other group of fascinating, flying creatures: Bats! Many of the same technical challenges of monitoring bird also aggravate and perplex bat biologists. Their flight, for example, makes them difficult to catch or track. I was [...]
Summer storms on the horizon Since the field season has entered the summer months, we field technicians have met challenges that were quite rare in late March and early April. For example, this past week brought forth a series of rain events that were never a concern in the beginning of the field season. When we check our [...]
One of our main tasks over the past two months has been to conduct point counts for Cape Sable seaside sparrows. A point count is a survey method used to count birds, where an observer stands at a single location and records all of the birds seen and heard in a given amount of time. Through the [...]
The most important cue to observe when nest-searching is bird behavior. Cape Sable seaside sparrows nest in grass cups in the marl prairies of the Everglades, so finding their nest without watching them can be nearly impossible. Nest-finding has been my favorite aspect of all of my positions as a field technician, so I want to share [...]
Some days, it pays to be a bird biologist… …especially when you get to fly! As the biologist who is responsible for the Estuary Restoration Project surveys, I had the very great pleasure of being able to take to the skies in the name of science last week. In my day-to-day responsibilities, which are decidedly [...]
We are nearing the midpoint of the 2017 Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow field season, which seems like a good time to share some of the interesting sightings our crew has observed out in the field. The Florida Everglades has a rich diversity of wildlife. Some animals are more conspicuous, but most of the time we [...]
South Florida is considered to be one of the most interesting birding locations in the country and reasonably so. On a nice spring morning, you can see dozens of species of migratory birds flying overhead. You can also find amazing wintering birds, such as the scissor-tailed flycatcher and rufous hummingbird, or breeding birds, such as swallow-tailed [...]
Sunrise on the Everglades The fog hovered over the sawgrass clumps as my fellow field techs and I walked to follow the harsh buzzy okachee-weee sounds in the distance. The field was saturated with morning dew and the sun was slowly beginning to rise. Suddenly, a flash of brown and yellow appeared in the distance. We got [...]
Or – “What does it do for us?” Two questions I get asked very often, sometimes at the same time put together in one compound sentence. It is an anthropocentric question that I personally find very difficult to answer for a number of reasons. I’ve been asked this question countless times and yet I still [...]