Ice, Ice, Baby

From Port Clinton, Ohio, Kenn writes: We braved the intense cold and the ice-covered roads last night to go to band practice, and then the weather socked us anyway: Sully, our lead guitar player, was called away for an emergency having to do with pipes freezing and bursting. The rest of the band spent a while working out chord progressions of new material anyway before calling it a night.

At some point, messing around, I started playing the famous bassline from the hit "Under Pressure" by David Bowie and Queen -- the same bassline that was lifted, essentially note for note, by Vanilla Ice for his hit single rap classic "Ice Ice Baby." Kim had performed this song a couple of times with her old band, Four Thorn Rose, not as a planned part of the show but to fill in time while someone changed a broken guitar string. Sure enough, as soon as I started playing the bassline, Kim jumped in with the lyric, delivering it with tons of rapper attitude: Will it ever stop, yo -- I don’t know ... Deadly, when I play a dope melody, anything less than the best is a felony ... Girls were hot wearin' less than bikinis, Rockman lovers drivin' Lamborghinis ... ice, ice, baby ... On and on, a rap anthem, all the more authentically gangsta-ish because it’s based on a stolen bassline. Fletch jumped in on drums, and the handful of other people hanging around at Mango Mama’s watched in awe as Kim rapped out this long long song without missing a beat.

We can’t help thinking about ice right now. It has been wickedly cold the last few days; on Sunday, when we had expected to do the Fremont Christmas Bird Count, the temperature went down to 4 Fahrenheit with wind chills of 25 below zero. The ice storm that we had Friday morning -- the last time the temp was barely above freezing -- coated everything with thick ice that’s still there. In a separate post, we’ll talk about how the birds are faring in this weather. But for anyone who keeps bird feeders, this is the weather in which the birds need help the most. They can find food under snow, but when ice locks things up, the birds can be in serious trouble.

After all this cold weather, we’re looking forward to going away -- to Antarctica! I know from previous experience that the weather is surprisingly mild at this season. We travel by ship along the coastline, and the temperature rarely gets much below freezing. It would be different, it would be unimaginably cold, if we went to the Antarctic interior, but we wouldn’t be seeing birds there. So we’ll explore the islands and the coast, and we’ll see lots of ice, but we won’t encounter the kind of intense cold that has hit the American Midwest the last few days.

Coronation Island, in the South Orkney Islands, off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Kenn took this photo on his third Antarctic trip in 1992.

她陰魂不息 云頂某某酒店

在某一個星期六， 我与好友曉佩， 嘉倩到云頂去遊玩。因為我們坐晚上的最後一班車到某高山游勝地，
所以到了那兒大概有九點多了。 我們三人都住在酒店里的同一間房， 收拾好行李後，
大家便坐在一起談天說地。 忽然間談到鬼節， 在我們三人之中只有我是個膽小鬼。 越談越刺激，
談到夜晚十一時四十五分。 嘉倩因為很餓便說要下去買東西吃， 留下我一個人。
我為了要面子便硬著頭皮答應了， 因為只剩下我一個人， 所以我只好讀故事書， 當我讀得津津有味時，
突然有人敲門， 我便跑去開門， 有位少女拿著一包東西說："妳的朋友叫我把食物拿給妳。"
過後她便走了， 我好奇為什麼嘉倩与曉佩自己不拿上來呢？ 我把食物放在飯桌上。我想了又想，
又有人敲門， 我一開門， 我便嚇了一跳， 因為嘉倩和曉佩都拿著一包新鮮的熱狗，
我便好奇地問到："剛才妳們不是叫人拿食物上來給我嗎了？" 曉佩說："沒有呀！"，
於是我便指著桌上那包食物說："剛才有位少女交給我一包東西， 她說是妳們托她交給我的。"
我們三人的眼神立刻注視在桌上那包東西。 不一會兒， 那包東西不翼而飛了。
嘉倩与曉佩說只是心理作用， 可是， 我的确收到那包東西啊！
大家吃飽後， 便繼續談天， 一陣陣冷風迎面吹來， 曉佩立刻走向窗口要把玻璃窗關上，
怎知， 玻璃窗早已被關上了。 這時候隱隱約約看見一件衣服挂在樹上， 由於曉佩不迷信，
所以不加以理會， 談到兩點， 我覺得很累便入眠了。
第二天， 我們很早便起床， 梳洗一番後便去吃早餐， 然後到處遊玩。 大家玩得很高興，
到傍晚七點許， 我們才依依不捨地回房休息， 我們回到房里， 便輪流沖涼。 當輪到嘉倩沖涼時，
有人敲門。 於是， 嘉倩便去開門。 一開門， 有一陣陣寒風吹了進來， 她以為有人玩她， 便不加以理會，
繼續沖涼， 當手觸摸到浴缸的水時， 發覺暖水變成了冷水， 又傳來一陣陣的哭泣聲，
嘉倩被嚇得手忙腳亂地穿上衣服便跑去浴室， 誰料到， 門自動地開了。
嘉倩邊跑邊喊："鬼...鬼...鬼...啊！" 曉佩和我被嘉倩這麼一喊， 頓時嚇呆了。
隆...隆...隆...外面下起大雨。 我們非常害怕， 便一起去關窗。 當時，
我們看見一位少女吊在樹上而且還對著我們微微笑， 我們被嚇得魂不附体， 拔腿就跑去房門，
當走到樓梯時， 一位老工人見我們如此慌張便問我們甚麼事， 我們一五一十地告訴他，
他聽了後臉色變了， 然後誥訴我們："以前有一位少女住在妳們現在所住的房間，
因為被男友拋棄才會在那樹上吊頸死掉， 她的魂一直得不到安息！
我們聽了， 立刻要求老板換房， 經過這次的經驗後， 我們不敢再住那間酒店了。

Seriously Buzzed

From Home Base, Kim Writes: I know that in the dead of winter in Ohio the last thing you'd think I'd be thinking about are hummingbirds. But yesterday, while looking through my collection of bad fuzzy videos, I found one that I thought I had lost.

You can't imagine how happy I was to find this, in spite of its entry into the bad fuzzy video vault. I know the video is tiny on the screen (if anyone has suggestions on how I can make this work more effectively, please share!) it's sort of out of focus, and in general, kind of crappy, but please take a look at it anyway. I hope that as fellow birders you'll understand how blessed I felt as I witnessed this tiny creature growing, learning, and ultimately striking out on "his" own.

Buzzed on sugar water delivered by his Mama, who took advantage of the feeder in our yard, "Junior" tests his wings. He would sit quietly for long periods, but, as soon as Mama brought him some sugar, he would become very animated, moving about the nest, and testing his tiny wings in the most adorable way.

Just to clarify: I don't actually know if the bird in the video was a male or female. With youngsters of the small "gorgetted" hummingbirds (of which there are 8 species in North America), sex cannot be reliably determined without having the bird in the hand. At that point, it comes down to things like: the shape of the outer primaries, width and shape of the rectrices (tail feathers) and the shade of white coloration in the throat. All that aside, the first day that we discovered our little treasure, I dubbed him Junior. I know, I know,---kinda lame and unoriginal, but it was the first thing that came to mind as I watched him that first day, and it just sort of stuck.

Since I first became fascinated with birds, one thing I always hoped for was to find an active hummingbird nest. Here in the east, we have only one breeding species of hummer, but it's a good one! Ruby-throated Hummingbirds are real charmers. Loads of attitude and charisma make up for their diminutive size and the lack of hummingbird diversity in our part of the world.

When Kenn and I got married and moved into our first home, it didn't seem likely that there would be many birds nesting in our yard, let alone a hummer. We were in the country, but surrounded on all sides by the monoculture of farm fields: Mostly corn, wheat, and soy beans. Our yard had a few mature trees, mostly Maples and Pines, but not much else to recommend to the discerning bird looking for a place to raise young. But, we hung our feeders with hope and the bird gods delivered.

We noticed hummers coming to visit our feeder and were thrilled. But, to be honest, we never even thought of looking for a nest. One afternoon we were out in the backyard when a hummingbird buzzed past and into one of the pines. We stood in utter astonishment as she began to work on what appeared to be the makings of a nest! Kenn dashed for the scope and we spent the next 4 hours watching this industrious little fairy as she labored to create her haven.

And here it is! What an amazing example of miniature architecture. From the day we discovered it, it took her 6 days to construct this masterpiece and lay 2 eggs.

The list of building materials sounds more like a spell from a Harry Potter book than nest material: Spider's silk and thistle down. A bit of lichen all around. Weave a cup and make a wish. Fairies fill this tiny dish....

After watching for many hours, I finally surrendered to the call of duty and went into the house to get some work done. About a half an hour later, Kenn comes rushing into the house with this dazed look on his face and says, "You've got to come out here and see this."

Back outside, and in the front yard this time, and, you'll never believe this....ANOTHER HUMMINGBIRD NEST. Less than 30 yards from the one being constructed in the backyard, our little overachiever had herself another nest, (Yes, it was the same female hummer!) and this one was filled to capacity with two stubby-billed little imps. I am not afraid to admit that I cried. It was just so spectacularly magical to have not one, but TWO hummingbird nests in our tiny, postage stamp yard, and to discover them on the same day! The realization that this tiny bird would be actively building one nest, while raising two demanding "kids" at the same time was just emotional overload for me.

After studying her behavior very closely, and getting her timing on and off the nest worked out, I waited until she had left the nest to forage, and I snuck in and took this photo. I stood on the tippy top of our ladder, and still had to hold the camera up as far as I could reach, try to aim as best I could, and then hope that I had gotten something....

Aren't they beautiful? They look so big on the screen, but in life they were so tiny: about the size of your average kidney bean.

All this intense hummingbird action filled our life with high drama! On the very first day, we watched in horror as Junior's sibling decided that "he" was ready to face the big bad world, and launched himself out of the nest. Calling it a launch is perhaps a bit generous, and he didn't make it far before crash landing into a big clump of thistles. We rushed to his rescue, and after holding him for a few minutes to make sure that he was intact, he buzzed out of Kenn's hands and up into our Mulberry tree.

Check out that stubby bill. I was shocked at how rapidly their bills grew as we watched them visit our feeders.

Once he was safely in the Mulberry, he began calling, and Mama came to the rescue, feeding him for the rest of the afternoon before he disappeared. He returned the next day to visit the our feeder, and returned every day for about two weeks, eventually joined by Junior after he too made his brave exit from the nest.

I have a banding permit, and I would have banded him, but my gear was at the Observatory, and I didn't want to hold him long enough to go get it. Hummingbird bands are, of course, very tiny, and made of incredibly light weight aluminum, pressed into sheets, and stamped with the band number. The material is so thin that we cut them out with scissors.

Here's one compared to a Great Horned Owl band.

I have had close encounters with thousands of birds at the Observatory's songbird banding station. I have banded dozens of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, and my fascination with these tiny dynamos increases with each individual whose life I "touch" for a few moments. But, I will never forget this little feathered family and they way that they touched us for a few magical weeks.

Bird Photo Quiz Quiz

From Birding Central, Kenn writes: Back when "publishing" always involved ink and paper, a Photo Quiz was popular in various bird magazines. A challenging photo (or two or three) would be presented in one issue of the magazine, with the answer(s) to be revealed in the next issue. Birders would study the photos and their field guides, discuss the quiz with their pals, then wait a month or two or three for the next issue to see if they’d gotten the answer right.

Today, in the age of online publishing, photo quizzes are legion. There are literally dozens of "mystery bird" photos posted every week on websites and blogs. Followers of these quizzes wait only days for the answers, not weeks or months. Other things have changed as well: birders researching a tricky photo today are more likely to look for pictures on the internet, and a fair percentage of those online photos will be misidentified or mislabelled. And when the online quiz posts its answer, there’s a chance that the answer will be wrong. So there’s a new kind of edgy challenge to the game.

Quizzes in print have a longer history. In the 1970s (when I was a rabid kid birder) we got our photo-quiz fix by looking at British Birds, a fine monthly that was then publishing more on identification than all the North American periodicals put together. A few of us crazed American and Canadian birders pored over every issue of British Birds, tried to work out the photo quiz, and then eagerly read the detailed answer to the previous month’s quiz. It was such an educational feature that we wondered why North American bird journals didn’t follow suit. But not until 1980 did Birding, the magazine of the American Birding Association, begin to run a regular photo quiz feature (a feature that continues today, by the way). I have warm feelings about the Birding photo quiz because I was in charge of it, writing the answers for almost every issue, for ten years, starting in the mid-1980s. But that wasn’t my first experience with writing photo quiz answers.

We’re not going to add one more online mystery photo to this week’s crop. Instead, we have a different kind of challenge, one that will test your knowledge of photography, publications, and the history of the birding community.

Here’s the question: What was the first publication in North America to run a regular bird photo identification quiz?

If you think you know the answer, or if you want to guess, send us a comment. If no one gets it, we’ll post the answer in a week. (Of course, a week from now is the 24th, and the guys will all be out doing their last-minute Christmas shopping, but ... ) The answer is sort of surprising. To entice you to enter, we’ll offer a prize (perhaps an autographed copy of a rare historical birding publication!).

The CBC Shuffle

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kim writes: We had a great time on the Toledo CBC, which is run by the Toledo Naturalists' Association, a group that can make any experience fun.

Case in point... Check this out. I know it's kind of dark, but just look at my CBC Comrades as they seek to rid themselves of a "sticky" situation that we found ourselves in after we took a wrong turn down a VERY muddy road.

Don't they look like some strange species dancing on a lek? * Note - There are a few females in the video, but they seem pretty unaffected by the displaying males.

Hey Kenn, maybe next year we could do a CBC in, ohhh..I don't know...Key Largo?!

I'll be CBC-ing you ...

From under a pile of blankets, Kenn writes: Okay, picture this. It's Sunday morning -- yesterday morning, and we're out before it's fully daylight, standing in the soggy weeds along the edge of a soggy woods. The temperature is above freezing, but the only way we know that is because the wind-driven precipitation hitting our faces is rain, not ice. And my thoughts are running something like this:

- According to a US Fish & Wildlife Service survey in 2006, there are approximately 81,400,000 bird watchers in the United States.

- If that's true, then last year, there were 81,353,380 bird watchers in the United States who did not take part in the Christmas Bird Count (CBC). But last year set a new high record for participation!

Standing there in the freezing wet night and thinking about it, I'm reminded of the late lamented Rick Blom, who might have commented that "no one does this, and if you try it, you'll understand why." Still, we are out there doing it. Kim and I were out all day yesterday on the Toledo CBC, and we actually had a great time and saw a lot of birds, but I'm pondering two rhetorical questions:

1. If we must have a Christmas Bird Count, why couldn't Jesus have had the decency to be born at a warmer time of year?

2. Given the evident popularity of birding, why doesn't the CBC draw more participants than it does?

Those are, as I said, rhetorical questions, though I'd love to hear from anyone who has an answer. But I'm trying to formulate a more serious question about how bloggers relate to the reality of the birding community and how the CBC relates to both. That question isn't in coherent form yet, so please check back for it when you can.

From Geneva to Beirut on a peace-building mission

I started a two-nation journey with a peace-building workshop in Geneva, organised by news agency InfoSud and journalism network Media21. Geneva served as an appropriate destination as it is home to approximately 200 international organisations. It is where decision makers, diplomats, mediators and warring parties meet.One of the most prominent international organisations in Geneva is the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), part of International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The organisation's logo is such a powerful symbol of neutrality that it has been abused by governments to serve their own interests. The Red Cross recently came under pressure to adopt a third symbol and opted for the red diamond.At the Red Cross museum in Geneva, the first exhibit that greets visitors are passages from the holy books of major religions, including Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Hinduism among others, that speak of human rights. The museum has a fascinating collection of exhibits, including the First Geneva Convention.I also visited the United Nations Office at Geneva. The building, called Palais des Nations (Palace of Nations), was the headquarters of the League of Nations between 1929 and 1938 and became the UN office in Geneva in the 1950s. Switzerland did not become a member of the United Nations until 2002 as part of its policy of neutrality. The joining made the country the 190th member state.The next leg of the journey was to Beirut, part of a field trip to see the aftermath of war. Lebanon saw a brutal month-long war with Israel in the south during the summer of 2006. I arrived at the height of political tension in the city, much of which escalated after the war. Here you can see graffiti on a wall reading "[Rafiq] Hariri only", in an area that is considered a stronghold of the March 14 movement led by Sa'ad Hariri, Rafiq's political heir.Areas of Beirut that would usually be crowded with tourists from the Gulf and around the world were silent, with little business or activity. Restaurateurs in the downtown area said business had not been so bad in years, blaming the political deadlock and the long-held protest by the opposition. In the capital, I met the Swiss ambassador to Lebanon, a political analyst and former finance minister Georges Corm, who gave me their take on the war with Israel and the political situation there.I also met Hezbollah officials who took me on a tour of the Dahiyah, the southern suburbs of Beirut, which saw heavy bombing by Israel during the war. Rebuilding has started and is being spearheaded by a new company called Promise, with the slogan: To build the Dahiyah better than it was. The company is controlled by Hezbollah and officials say funding for the rebuilding has come from various Gulf and Arab countries.The next stop was Tyre in south Lebanon. I stayed in Old Tyre, which has changed hands a number of times. The Mediterranean port city is perhaps best known as an ancient Phoenician city. Tyre has a fascinating history. Few buildings in the area we stayed in were built later than the 1800s or 1900s, and many were much older.Roman ruins in Tyre. The city has changed hands between Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, the Crusaders and Ottomans. It is not uncommon to find local fishermen illegally selling ancient coins and relics to tourists. The city today is home to Christians and Shiite Muslims, with mosques and ancient churches a few steps away from each others.Political symbols were all over Tyre, as they are in Beirut. But most of Tyre's Christians are supporters of the Free Patriotic Movement led by Michelle Aoun, and the Shiites are supporters of Aoun's allies Amal and Hezbollah, led by Nabih Berri and Hassan Nasrallah respectively. Political souvenirs, like this one of Nasrallah, are popular among tourists, workers of international organisations and the soldiers serving in Lebanon under the United Nations, shopkeepers say.The yellow building next to the lighthouse is where we stayed, Al Fanar hotel. It is a family-owned business for many generations. The owner's wife told me that every floor has its own history. The basement served as stables during the Crusades, which has been turned into a tiny nightclub. The ground floor was built in the early Ottoman period and the first floor in the last century.Dalia Farran, spokesperson of the United Nations Mine Action Coordination Centre (UNMACC), explains the damage caused by the mines and cluster bombs Israel had used in Lebanon. Once demining operations were almost over, the region came under attack again by Israel in 2006, when approximately one million cluster munitions were dropped. Dalia said the failure rate observed on the cluster sub-munitions during the war proved to be higher than average.On display is a map that Israel has provided to the United Nations, apparently indicating the areas in which the bombs were dropped. The UNMACC says they are of no use to them since the drawings are very vague. What the UN has persistently asked for, says Dalia Farran, is data showing the coordinates of each drop. Israel says it has fulfilled its obligation by handing over this drawings. Next stop was the office of Handicap International. The organisation is one of a few that is engaged in cluster sub-munitions demining activity in south Lebanon. Other organisations have lost a few members of clearance teams. Handicap International has not lost any. The organisation coordinates with village mukhtars (or leaders) to inform about and attempt to clear bomblets, if found and sends in teams to search and clear. Clearance teams search the reported areas with special detectors and slowly start to uncover the bomblet before either removing it or destroying it in a control explosion.Many of the cluster sub-munitions were dropped in residential areas and farms in the hilly south of Lebanon, where the ribbons on some munitions would get stuck in tree branches and make them harder to spot. A lot of residents or the area and families rely on farming to make a living, which was disrupted for some. And it was time for us to leave Al Fanar hotel, which is popular with members of international organisations that live in Tyre. It is business as usual when I bid adieu.