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| Robins & Their Prize |
Many of the Autumn olive berries had been picked since I passed by last week. The "low-hanging fruit" for robins appeared to be less about being easy to reach from the ground than about being on the outermost branches. The inner branches still teemed with white-speckled, sweet red berries. No one was actively going after the berries when I walked by, but a trio of robins was hanging out in a nearby redwood, perhaps already sated from an earlier morning feast.
Yesterday I dropped off my ebike at Barbary Coast Cyclery for a new chain and brake rotor, then began a slow walk toward home through Golden Gate Park. I figured the bike would be ready by the end of the day, but I got called back in less than two hours, while I was still poking around in the park. Today I poked around some more, and both days I couldn't help wondering where all the birds were.
In general, bird numbers have crashed quite a bit in the last 50 years, but walking around in quiet woodlands with little or no bird-life leaves me sad and wondering. Shouldn't there be more birds around? Golden Gate Park looks like a land of plenty -- plenty of nuts, fruits, seeds, nectar, insects. However, what looks plentiful to me might look almost like a food desert to a songbird such as a chickadee who needs to eat about 35 percent of its body weight in fruit, seeds, and bugs every day.
Walking across Whiskey Hill this morning I encountered a couple of juncos, and that was about it. Meanwhile I could look through the trees at the whole Inner Sunset and see a landscape covered wall-to-wall with human habitations. I couldn't help yearning a little bit for a better balance on the non-human side of the scale.
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| Chestnut-backed Chickadee |
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| The chickadee was probing for insects under the bark. |
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| Western Bluebird at Elk Glen Lake |
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| A Townsend's warbler dropped in at a small creek in the SF Botanical Garden. |
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| It bathed briefly, then flew up into a tree branch to preen for a quarter of a minute before flying off to continue feeding. |
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| At Lily Lake today, this Cassin's vireo was sharing a willow with a Townsend's warbler. |
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| The vireo caught a small caterpillar and managed to hide both its eye and the insects behind skinny branches.... |
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| Meanwhile, the Townsend's warbler was yanking on what appeared to be a curled leaf, probably trying to get at an insect within. |
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| Cassin's Vireo |
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| Townsend's Warbler |
Two Very Short Takes
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