BirdNote

Riding the train west to New Haven or New York, you pass salt marshes with old and evocative names like The Saw Pit, Great Harbor, and Old Quarry. Watch for marsh birds - yellowlegs, sandpipers, Snowy Egrets. In the fall, you may find Northern Pintails, teal, and Black Ducks, like this one.

Although it was once considered a diminutive form of Canada Goose, genetic research has shown the Cackling Goose to be a separate species. Its small voice fits nicely its small size. Cacklers breed along the coast of Alaska and winter from Washington south to Mexico.

Salmon once battled their way up the Elwha River to spawn. And every fall, hundreds of eagles feasted on the spent fish. But a century ago, two dams were built on the river, and they reduced the river's salmon population by more than 90 per cent.

Just a couple dozen miles off the Northwest coast, immense dark birds with long, saber-shaped wings glide without effort above the waves. These graceful giants are Black-footed Albatrosses, flying by the thousands near the edge of the continental shelf.

Thousands of acres of south San Francisco Bay that lay under industrial salt ponds for over a century are now being restored to native tidal marsh. The South Bay Salt Pond Restoration Project has acquired almost 24 square miles that salt producers had diked along the bay's tidal margin.

Coast to coast and border to border, Birding Trails offer great opportunities to find birds. On a summer trip in New England, along the Connecticut River between Vermont and New Hampshire, you can hear the vividly colored Blackburnian Warbler.

Bird calls can transport us to times deep in our memory. Is the sound of the Whip-poor-will at dusk part of your memory? Maybe you heard Common Loons calling on a northern lake. Perhaps you awoke on a summer morning to the cooing of a Mourning Dove.

September 27th marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. The book awakened the public to the dangers of DDT and other pesticides. But many weren't ready to listen.

A grebe, a bird that you'd normally see on a lake, sits on a parking lot. The grebe struggles and flaps, but cannot fly. At the same time, on the island of Kauai, a resident finds a Newell's Shearwater, another water bird, stranded on a tennis court.

Is that big black bird a crow or a raven? How can you tell? Ravens (seen right here) often travel in pairs, while crows (left) are seen in larger groups. Also, study the tail as the bird flies overhead. A crow's tail is shaped like a fan, while the raven's tail appears wedge-shaped.

At the fall equinox, gillnetter Misha Noonan would often get stuck at the far east end of the Copper River Delta, waiting out the storms.

A phalarope (like this Red-necked Phalarope ) twirls on the water's surface, once per second, spinning and pecking. As it does so, it forces water away from itself on the surface, causing an upward flow from as deep as a foot or more. With this flow come the tiny animals on which it feeds.

Today marks the mid-point between June's longest day and December's shortest day. We may hardly notice, but ancient cultures closely watched the changes in the sun's daily patterns.

Collective nouns are a mixture of poetry, alliteration, and description. Victorians often made up names for groups of birds, as a parlor game. Many names bring a vision of the birds instantly to mind. How about this stare of owls? They're Burrowing Owls!

The Common Murre is among the few species of birds that can "fly" under water. When above the water, the 18"-long murre must flap frantically to stay aloft. But beneath the waves, with its flipper-like wings partly extended, it is a streamlined, masterful swimmer.