Crean's Mid-Summer Birthday

Waiting for "Happy Birthday" to finish



Big inhale.



Big exhale.



Waiting for the cake to be served.

PAD 24 - Western Willet

Western Willet. Valley County, MT June, 19, 2010.

PAD 23 - Got Milk?

I came across this calf a few days ago. He was nursing but pulled away from his meal to glance at me when I drove by him and his mother. He had a milk mustache that went from his forehead to his chin. It gave me a good chuckle because he reminded me of the eating habits of a couple of other little boys I know and I backed up because I just had to get a photo.
Valley County, Montana. July 22, 2010.

PAD 22 - American Bison

American Bison. Fort Peck, Montana. July24, 2010

Tanzania

This fall I hope to see another Southern Ground Hornbill like the one I took a photo of last year at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, CO. Except this time I hope to see it where it belongs - the plains of Tanzania.

I have been selected to join a team of nine other biologist-types to assist five community based Wildlife Management Areas with their biological inventory and monitoring programs. We will be split up into teams of two, one team for each management area, with the task of initiating or modifying existing monitoring programs with area specific methods. The monitoring must be meaningful and sustainable in places with limited resources such as electricity. These sideboards certainly provides focus on what can and should be done in these areas.

I am currently getting all my paperwork and immunizations in order. One of the first items I purchased was Birds of East Africa by Terry Stevenson and John Fanshawe. Even better, many of the illustrations were painted by one of my favorite artists, John Gale as well as Jonathan Kingdon's Pocket Guide to African Mammals. Once I figure out which WMA I will be working at I may wind up bringing Birds of Kenya and Northern Tanzania by Zimmerman, Turner, and Pearson.

I am really looking forward to this experience, hopefully making at least a meaningful contribution to wildlife conservation, as well as just being in Africa. I have been reviewing my field guide, trying to at least get a handle on what the birds look like and where I might find them in the field guide when I am trying to figure out which Cisticola I am looking at (yeah right). Hornbills, Sunbirds, Weavers, Starlings (the really great African species), Lions, Leopards, and Hippos, oh my.

PAD 21 - American White Pelican

American White Pelican. July 22, 2010

What is this bird?

This is more of a pet peeve post than a real ID question. This is a McCown's Longspur. Not a McCowan's Longspur.
For some reason the "McCowan's" spelling has shown up in a number of different places recently and it is driving me nuts. The worst was in a special advertisement section for birding in Montana printed in a recent Audubon Magazine.
Great way to draw birders to Montana - they don't even know how to spell the birds name correctly - do they know anything about what is written in the article?
At least it isn't as embarrassing as a recent bird trail publication produced by the Custer Country travel region in Montana. Despite a number of people commenting on the plethora of errors in the publication, ranging from misspelled bird names and other bird name mistakes - you can find a "Roufous-sided and Spotted towhee" at numerous places (they are different names for the same bird). At Mikoshika State Park you can apparently find Lappet-faced Vulture from Africa based on the photo used for this site. It is supposed to depict a Turkey Vulture! See it for yourself here (even better - rather than fix the mistakes that were pointed out to them numerous times, they reproduced in online for everyone to see).
Travel Montana really doesn't have to do much help bird related tourism in Montana. The birds found here could sell this place almost by themselves, but for some reason the tourism people have not only not consulted with the people most interested in helping them, but they have outright ignored the expertise in this state, resulting in a number of rather embarrassing errors. If I was using this information for some other state it would suggest to me that the people really had no idea what they were talking about and I would question the validity of all the information provided.
It's not that I am driven to turn the birds and habitats I care about into a tourist destination, its just that I hope that these habitats and birds that inhabit them can be thought of as more than wastelands only worth grazing and hunting. If we could demonstrate some income from other uses perhaps thoughts and concerns of conservation would follow. I really believe that communities (or at least the right people in a community) need to have an interest in conservation or it will not work or will continue to be a source continued conflict. Perhaps the values provided by birding related income is a way to help that along.
Well, this certainly wandered away from a spelling pet peeve!