60th Bird Species Identified in our Backyard Habitat

I've been watching birds with a passion since 2003 and started keeping a list in 2004. Since then, my wife, daughter, five cats and I have seen or heard 60 species on our 1/3 acre plot in the suburbs of Washington DC. The latest showed up two days ago. My daughter called it a warbler and even guessed that it might be a common yellow throat. Tough call in the Fall!

I saw it (her) this morning--sadly camera-less--but looked up the bird the moment I came inside. I'm pretty sure my daughter is right. We've got at least one female or immature Common Yellowthroat. Interestingly, yesterday, the bird was quiet and almost sluggish. Our guess is that she had spent the night in flight and was exhausted. She apparently heard our local birds and stopped for a bite. Today, (or yesterday now that we're right at midnight) she was much more active, gleaning insects from our goldenrod, rosa rugosa, and redtwig dogwoods-- chiking as she gleaned. Could she have been calling to another of her species? That's why I caveated by saying at least one.

I love the fall because I never know what new bird is going to show. I'm sad to think that we will probably not see anymore Scarlet Tanagers, since the Town of Vienna (TREE TOWN by the Arbor Day Foundation) allowed the almost clear cutting of three acres of woods two blocks from our house a few years ago. We subsequently learned from a visit to the USDA's Greenbelt facility that the Scarlet Tanager needs three acres of uninterrupted woods to survive. We've not seen the Brown Creeper or Brown Thrasher, or heard the Barn owl since then either.

Age Of Stupid: Nice Try, Let's Try Something Else

I was disappointed with Age of Stupid, the new global warming documentary by Franny Armstrong and Lizzie Gillett. I liked the premise and agree with their message. Where I find fault is that people like me are already predisposed to listen to their message, which is: we need to act now to reverse the effects of increasing green house gases on the earth's climate. That action needs to be taken internationally, nationally, locally and individually. Unfortunately, the documentary is much like Fahrenheit 9/11, preaching to a choir with zero hope of convincing the other side--in this case, the global warming naysayers and doubters, especially those in the United States, to even listen. Here's the premise of the documentary, which builds it story on published scientific studies:

An old man living in the year 2055 and on an Earth that has been devastated because of global warming, wars over resources, droughts and floods watches footage from 2008 and before and asks why when we knew that we had to do something, we did not. That footage includes two very cute Iraqi children--Jamila and Adnan Bayyoud whose father "was killed by the Americans." Adnan, understandably, says how much he hates the Americans. OK STOP. The US is the biggest culprit when it comes to using more than our fair share of resources, we refused to participate in Kyoto. So we are--ahead of the Chinese and Indians--the most important audience for the film. With the emphasis on the Iraq war anyone who was not knee jerk against the war, is quite likely to tune out the rest of the message. It was stupid to inject that political issue into one that is about the survival of the plant and animal species of the planet--including homo sapiens. I'm disappointed that such an opportunity has been missed.

But the movie did have some desired effects-- it got me thinking about some of the challenges faced by proponents of green technology. One of these is the placement of wind turbines. In Age of Stupid, wind farm developer Piers Guy suffers a loss because land owners are convinced that the turbines will destroy their "view." The NIMBY syndrome is rampant and folks who want to do good should take it into account. Piers, what about all the places where the view is already destroyed by smoke stacks, oil platforms, and landfills? What about thinking about how we can harness the wind as it whips through cities?

I visited Boston a few years ago and noticed on the taxi ride from the airport that a number of buildings near Logan Airport had what looked like really large old fashioned floor fans on their roofs. These could very well have been wind turbines. The relatively small size would necessitate a cage around them to prevent birds and people from being hurt by the extremely fast movement of the blades. This is a guess, but if I'm wrong, why not do this?

Two places that immediately come to mind to place offshore windfarms in the US are the coast of Florida and the Gulf Coast. If oil rigs can be seen, then the view is already ruined. My only concern would be to ensure that they did not add to the annual kill of migratory birds. How about all the despoiled land in Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia, where strip mining and the horrific practice of mountain top removal have already destroyed the view? How about locations that are already filled with smoke stacks and cooling towers of power plants, such as near the Delaware Memorial Bridge, along portions of the Great Lakes? Choosing places like this rather than mountain tops that have yet to be ruined by cell towers makes more sense to me. And about those cell towers--they kill birds! Is there anything that can be done about that? What about the Cell companies figuring out how they can combine a power generating wind turbine on their already ugly tower?

The next issue that comes to mind--although it was not addressed in the movie--is the over reliance on centralized power sources. Why? If the power is coming to my house, why shouldn't my power company figure out how to help me generate some of that power on my suburban plot? Solar panels on my roof? How about small wind turbines, like the ones I thought I saw in Boston?