This morning, a male cowbird singing, at Salt Point. Never heard that before. A very low volume series of thin crispy notes. No clucking, as in some recordings of its song.
The bird sat very close, on top of the little pine/fur tree at the lakeside fork of the path to the Bluebird Path. It refused to leave its perch and continued singing even as I stood right under the tree. Ps. the weirdest cowbird research for me was the Living Bird piece reporting on how a cowbird knows it is a cowbird, and not a whatever other bird, despite being raised by them as slave parents. It was discovered that the grown chick gets up at 3am and leaves the slaving foster parents' nest, to go hang out with other teenager cowbirds in a nearby field. Next question is, how do hey know that they should get out of bed at 3am and go to the field party and get to know their cowbirdness? ps. I could not find the reference to the Living Bird magazine article where I read this. I only find this partial account, also interesting but no mention of the teenager party: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/if-brown-headed-cowbirds-are-reared-by-other-species-how-do-they-know-they-are-cowbirds-when-they-grow-up/ -- Magnus Fiskesjö n...@cornell.edu _________________________________ From: bounce-124539965-84019...@list.cornell.edu [bounce-124539965-84019...@list.cornell.edu] on behalf of Michael H. Goldstein [michael.goldst...@cornell.edu] Sent: Friday, April 10, 2020 8:05 PM To: CAYUGABIRDS-L Subject: Re: [cayugabirds-l] Cowbirds Cowbirds are crazier than you think…check out the research by Meredith West and Andrew King on the role of female cowbirds (who don’t sing) in shaping the development of juvenile males' song by using rapid wing gestures: http://www.indiana.edu/~aviary/Research/female%20visual%20displays.pdf and more generally, http://www.indiana.edu/~aviary/Publications.htm Cheers, Mike On Apr 10, 2020, at 7:49 PM, Peter Saracino <petersarac...@gmail.com<mailto:petersarac...@gmail.com>> wrote: I was having a cup of coffee looking out the window at 3 male and 3 female cowbirds going at the sunflower seeds. As I watched them it dawned on me that all of them were raised by foster parents!!! According to the Lab of O: "the cowbird does not depend exclusively on a single host species; it has been known to parasitize over 220 different species of North American birds". Crazy, wild stuff. Pete Sar -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: Welcome and Basics<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME> Rules and Information<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES> Subscribe, Configuration and Leave<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm> Archives: The Mail Archive<http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html> Surfbirds<http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds> BirdingOnThe.Net<http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html> Please submit your observations to eBird<http://ebird.org/content/ebird/>! -- _______________________________________________________________ Michael H. Goldstein Associate Professor Director, Eleanor J. Gibson Laboratory of Developmental Psychology Director, College Scholar Program Department of Psychology, Cornell University 270 Uris Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853 Office 607-793-0537; Lab 607-254-BABY; Fax 607-255-8433 https://psychology.cornell.edu/michael-h-goldstein Cornell B.A.B.Y. Lab: http://babylab.cornell.edu/ _______________________________________________________________ -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: Welcome and Basics<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME> Rules and Information<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES> Subscribe, Configuration and Leave<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm> Archives: The Mail Archive<http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html> Surfbirds<http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds> BirdingOnThe.Net<http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html> Please submit your observations to eBird<http://ebird.org/content/ebird/>! -- -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
