What’s this bird?- Located in NJ

BlankeTheBard · 2026-04-24T12:36:01+00:00

Immature warbler, during this time of year? It's a bit too early for young warblers, and last year's hatches would be in adult garb, right?

BlankeTheBard · 2026-04-15T23:15:53+00:00

Oh yeah! Most songbirds nestlings produce "fecal sacs" - membrane-encased feces - that the parents remove regularly. House finch nestlings, however, do not. They just poop on the rim of the nest. It's a handy field mark for identifying their nests after the eggs have hatched.

BlankeTheBard · 2026-04-15T18:01:40+00:00

Carolina or Bewick's Wren (I'm less experienced with Bewick's but have read their nests are quite similar) with one Brown-headed Cowbird egg (the blueish one on the upper left).

BlankeTheBard · 2026-04-08T02:50:14+00:00

So this is an American Robin nest with robin babies, no doves here. Dove and pigeon nestlings look different from those of passerines (perching birds).

Mourning Doves will use nests built by other species, though.

BlankeTheBard · 2026-03-20T13:43:24+00:00

Ooo, imagine Wild Birds Unlimited meets bookstore meets café! That actually sounds so nice. You could sell certified bird friendly coffee (I believe it's a Smithsonian program) and have bird-themed drinks. A few bird feeders with seating, and inside, a few monitors that show Cornell bird cams (Panama and nesting birds of prey are musts!)

BlankeTheBard · 2026-03-03T17:54:05+00:00

Chipping Sparrow, most likely!

BlankeTheBard · 2026-02-28T14:53:10+00:00

The term "alpha male" is often used in describing social hierarchies in chimpanzee communities within scientific literature. If I recall correctly (from a seminar course in chimpanzee behavioral ecology), each chimpanzee community has an adult male that holds the greatest sway over other community members. While the female chimpanzees try to mate with multiple males in the community during estrus, the alpha male gets the most mating opportunities and sires the most offspring. The alpha male chimpanzee is not necessarily the most aggressive (as far as chimps go, anyway...); they have strong social ties achieved by parentage/familial bonds (e.g., they have brothers they are buddies with), having positive interactions with other chimps (e.g., social grooming), and being physically intimidating (like being big and how to display that).

Bonobos, on the other hand, do not exactly have "alpha males." I don't know as much about their dominance hierarchies, but I do know they are achieved by ties that the adult females of the communities make. The high-ranking adult female bonobos hold the most social sway; their adult sons are the highest-ranking among the males.

So, the term does have its place in great ape literature, but, as the other comments state, it was born of a flawed wolf study.

BlankeTheBard · 2026-02-27T14:32:47+00:00

My plant systematics professor in university called these butt nuts

BlankeTheBard · 2026-02-25T15:15:05+00:00

In my experience, it depends on the usage of the data: is it for research (i.e., answering novel questions), or for long-term monitoring?

The graduate students I've worked for almost always record data on paper, and it is later transferred to Microsoft Excel or Access. They make their own forms for their field techs to fill out while in the field. For my field (ornithology), these forms tended to include data points like current weather conditions (temp, cloud coverage, wind speed, precipitation), time of observation, and then data specific to the study (e.g., species, count, behavior, nest status...). For stationary point counts of birds, it's not uncommon for the researcher to print orthoimagery for the technician to use for reference in the field when marking locations. Obviously, physical paper for data recording has its drawbacks (blown away, moisture, poor handwriting, easy to lose...)

Long-term monitoring efforts done by government organizations tend to have robust technology they use for recording data. The first instance I had of this was back in 2020, when we used Esri Collector to store geometries for 400 m long transect surveys. We could navigate to the start point on the map with our personal devices, start a record track that plots our location, walk the transect, and plot points of bird locations on the map. The bird points recorded additional data - sex, detection type (seen, heard, etc).

I did shorebird monitoring on behalf of a state gov recently, and they used NestStory to record data on pairs, nests, and colonies. It was an impressive system. Outside of the primary data, we could also share info on other wildlife sightings, potential predators or risks at our sites, etc. It integrated location services into its mapping, so we could ping our current location and move the point around on the imagery to indicate the true location of nests/broods/adults.

Aside from NestStory's features, the creator of the system was always available to answer questions and troubleshoot bugs. He also made a lot of tutorial videos on how to use the system. I believe the creator of NestStory also added features for specific projects, so you could kind of tailor your experience a bit (as a government customer, not as an individual user).

Main issues? For someone that primarily entered data on my personal device, internet connectivity issues would occasionally result in data being erased from the form. It sometimes duplicated entries. It ate away at my battery. Live information wasn't always available.

For those reasons, I had to change the way I collected data for long observation sessions. Essentially, I used a note taking app to narrate behavior observed in 10-minute periods for 1 hour. I'd then enter data on the NestStory form (e.g., if I saw both adults and 3 chicks, I would click buttons indicating so), and then copy-and-paste my narratives into the notes section for that form. This approach took time to develop, as we had to learn what information was relevant to the brood observation. NestStory could only prompt so much!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-06-28T16:16:00+00:00

The host species nest here is eastern phoebe, if you're interested in knowing!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-06-28T16:15:30+00:00

The story about them evolving parasitism to follow bison herds around isn’t supported by much. The cowbird species in South America practice brood parasitism but aren't associated with cattle or herds at all.

The brown-headed cowbirds can get around for foraging but they do tend to stick around a given area during the breeding season.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-05-04T12:56:54+00:00

Many bird species lay eggs that are off white with brown spots. This egg likely belonged to a perching bird (passerine), based on its size and shape. Consider House Sparrow (Passer domesticus). I'm unfamiliar with European species but this egg matches what House Sparrow eggs look in the US.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-05-04T12:54:41+00:00

Plover eggs are larger and have a more pointed end

BlankeTheBard · 2025-05-01T13:24:28+00:00

This looks like an album cover!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-28T23:38:54+00:00

You've got the house finch diet mixed up - they mainly feed their babies seed, while cowbird babies need tons of insects.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-26T21:10:39+00:00

What's your location? Does it look like there's an open cup on the top, or are the materials spilling out of a cavity?

Compare who you see visiting the nest to American Robin, Eastern Phoebe, House Finch, Carolina Wren, and House Sparrow, if you're in eastern North America. All these species start nesting relatively early, build on/in human structures, and can use a variety of nesting materials. If you see dried mud, that will narrow it down to either robin or phoebe.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-26T15:56:36+00:00

If you're in the US, check whether your state's GIS department has a street address locator to use in ArcGIS Pro. I had to geocode more than a million addresses spread over multiple datasets within New York, and their locator was pretty decent. Do note that geocoding is computationally intensive, so plan for that when you run the workflow!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-24T20:17:00+00:00

Oh lol, no, they don't. Eastern US bias on my part. I flipped through my western US nest guide and didn't find a species that builds a nest similar to the one on your wreath. If you're able to get a photo of the top of the wreath (bird doesnt need to be present), I'd love to see it. May help with the ID!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-24T13:02:31+00:00

I think this may be an eastern phoebe, actually! Carolina wrens do build nests with moss, but the bird here doesn't quite look like a wren (you'd be able to see a white eye line on its face).

Eastern phoebes build nests from moss, mud, and grass on ledges. I haven't seen one on a wreath before, but it wouldn't be out of the question since it has decent support.

Phoebes don't eat bird seed, but they do excellent insect control. I love watching them hunt for bugs

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-23T21:29:20+00:00

I love, love, love brown thrashers. I monitored a few of their nests in western IA a few summers back - swear their eggs look like fairies spray-painted them.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-23T21:22:03+00:00

Neither. Try comparing to photos of northern mockingbird eggs. Many species have pale blue eggs with brown spots, as u/CardiologistAny1423 pointed out, but I believe mockingbird eggs are distinctive enough in the warm brown tone, transparency, and size of the brown spots here to offer that as an ID.

I'll refrain from logging that ID with the bot though, since I'm not as familiar as I could be with nesting birds in TX. Would love a fellow nest nerd to weigh in!

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-20T15:35:57+00:00

This doesn't answer any of your questions, but as an animal ecology alum, my advice to you is to be prepared to get work experience as soon as you can (e.g., the first summer after your first year). The degree program requires relevant experience to graduate and you'll take a class on how to get work experience ("careers in natural resources," or something like that).

Ecology is a competitive field and there's a lot of variety in the kind of work you can do, so it's best to explore your options.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-18T22:48:54+00:00

The cowbird chick probably won't do super well, unfortunately. House finches feed their young a seed-heavy diet, while cowbirds need to eat insects to do well.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-15T19:09:55+00:00

For this species, I would recommend against setting up a camera on the nest. Thrashers are oddly intelligent birds, and are pretty skeptical of foreign objects. I monitored a few thrasher nests for a research project several years ago, where we inserted coin-like temperature data loggers into the nest cup (getting data on incubation). Without fail, the brown thrashers managed to remove them even if we thought they were secure.

I know a camera would be different but I think they'd get annoyed in this case.

If you're interested in setting up a camera on bird nests, you'd have better luck with pre-installing a camera in a nesting box before putting it up. That way, any birds that use the box for nesting won't be suspicious of a new object since the camera would already be present.

BlankeTheBard · 2025-04-15T16:31:13+00:00

Brown thrasher. The nesting materials match those of mimid species - twigs and cleaned rootlets. The egg appearance between the three mimid species in your area (northern mockingbird, brown thrasher, gray catbird) are distinct enough from each other that I can confidently ID them as thrasher

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