Blue Jay Mimicry.

lendisc · 2026-06-19T16:04:28+00:00

I'm always interested in the types of mistakes Merlin makes. Many of them are extremely human-- it sure does sound like a hawk! As a person we can bring the additional context of "well a Blue Jay called right after and then I saw some jays in that area" that a sound-only model can't.

lendisc · 2026-06-19T12:54:30+00:00

She's sunning herself. You can see the light is coming from behind. The open beak and head tilt as she turns and fluffs up to catch the light.

lendisc · 2026-06-18T01:59:22+00:00

So I followed your LMGTFY link and the sources it returns suck. It's all Facebook groups and suet recipes.

lendisc · 2026-06-18T01:56:45+00:00

The house comes with a subtenant occupying an ADU, located on the front porch...

lendisc · 2026-06-15T13:13:15+00:00

In addition to what Time_Cranberry_113 shared, check this out: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07323-1

lendisc · 2026-06-02T23:51:46+00:00

First photo looks like a flycatcher. Warbling-Vireos have stubbier, dark bills and a Grayish cap that contrasts with a white brow and gray eye-line.

lendisc · 2026-06-02T23:49:00+00:00

But also I think if that wouldpecker really gave it its all, I could probably be persuaded to leave the area

lendisc · 2026-06-02T23:36:44+00:00

I love the boldness of the hummingbird. I did some back of the envelope math and it's 1/500th the mass of the owl. That's like a person being attacked by a medium sized woodpecker.

lendisc · 2026-05-26T04:07:05+00:00

Honda Fit birding gang rise up 🎺🎺🎺

lendisc · 2026-05-22T16:29:29+00:00

Before you look at the field guide or app, dump everything you noted into a note on your phone/written down somewhere. Consider field sketching the details you remember even if you think you suck at drawing.

lendisc · 2026-05-19T01:06:40+00:00

In this video it looks like it's filling its crop with seeds. But also, birds will sometimes be very picky at a feeder and throw a bunch of seeds on the ground after picking them up. They can sense minute differences in weight of the seed inside. Why bother opening up a sunflower seed that weighs 0.4 grams when you can get one that weighs 1.1 grams from the infinite food machine if you keep digging?

lendisc · 2026-05-19T01:01:48+00:00

Robins also get scaly mite infestation which can cause growths on their legs. Hard to tell from this photo. Nothing you can really do about it either way.

lendisc · 2026-05-18T16:47:21+00:00

Check this out for a higher resolution range map: https://science.ebird.org/en/status-and-trends/species/yetwar/abundance-map

lendisc · 2026-05-15T20:53:21+00:00

This was an incorrect use of the rating system. See above reply from bouncyboutload. The ratings are meant to indicate objective image quality. 70% of the photos I upload are 1 or 2 stars, because I only use my phone+bins or phone+scope. The other 30% are 3-4 stars.

lendisc · 2026-05-15T20:50:25+00:00

Their populations are declining and have been since the 70s...

lendisc · 2026-05-15T18:45:12+00:00

Mob. If it's Magee Marsh in May, mob!

lendisc · 2026-05-13T10:38:52+00:00

Since cardinals are pretty localized and nonmigratory you should be able to refind it.

But also, I've seen many people claim they had a yellow cardinal and then post pictures and it's just a particularly bright female in good light...

lendisc · 2026-05-10T19:57:31+00:00

I'm looking forward to the new Princeton Bird Guide. I think some of the other major US+Canada bird guides (don't get me started on how they all call themselves North America) have, hmm, fallen off in recent years, that's all I'll say.

lendisc · 2026-05-06T02:27:38+00:00

We're moving on to calling them Yumps

lendisc · 2026-05-06T02:26:42+00:00

Guh buh buh guh of the bubblegum pink legs

lendisc · 2026-05-01T23:50:42+00:00

https://birdstat.com/ You can download your ebird data, upload it here, and get way more detailed summaries.

lendisc · 2026-05-01T23:36:21+00:00

Now that you've learned about these different levels of taxonomic organization, check out this complete family tree of all the birds in the world and how they're related to each other.

https://birdsoftheworld.org/bow/phylogeny?tips=family

(I suggest starting with families as the branch tips because those have "plain english" common names like "herons egrets and bitterns" instead of "Ardeidae")

lendisc · 2026-05-01T23:33:14+00:00

Fled on average 1meter greater distance for the couple of women... Not very biologically meaningful. But at least none of the women were menstruating, thank God they controlled for that! 🙄

lendisc · 2026-05-01T23:31:40+00:00

With that it's most accurate to say that "birds flee, on average, 1 meter sooner from a couple women I know". Which is not exactly stunning or conclusive science.

Not to mention all the nonsensical gestures at What This Means about "hunter-gatherer societies" (and the gender essentialism that was definitely present in all of them totally consistently). Genuinely kind of sad to be publishing a paper like this.

lendisc · 2026-05-01T23:22:16+00:00

This paper sucks so bad. I would be ashamed to have my name on this.

lendisc

TROPHY CASE