Quetzals, some the most beautiful birds in the world, are also members of the Trogonidae, the Trogon family. While the most famous Quetzal is the Resplendent Quetzal – next week’s bird – there are five other species, including this close cousin, the Golden-headed Quetzal. The name is misleading; the bronzish coloration of the male’s head…
There have been two recent images from the Mars Rover Perseverance and its amazing little helicopter companion, Ingenuity, that reminded WC that for all the faults and challenges of these modern times, we really do live in an age of miracles and wonders. The first was the images of one of Mars’ two tiny moonlets,…
Yesterday it was Mountain Bluebirds. Today it’s another blue bird. After an Indigo Bunting has flown 600 miles nonstop across the Gulf of Mexico, a bath in Dave’s Drip at Sabine Woods on the eastern Texas coast is pretty appealing. Of course, other bird species have the same idea, so you have to wait for…
It’s spring migration, WC’s favoritest time of the year. So WC is off chasing birds, and may have sketchy internet service as well as little time to write blog posts. In the event there are gaps in in the blog post stream the next week or two, here are some Mountain Bluebird photos taken this…
WC suspects some readers are getting tired of birds. So today WC will switch to mammals. Specifically flying mammals: Mexican Free-tailed Bats. The cave itself is an unprepossessing hole in the ground, about 20 feet wide and perhaps six feet tall. It’s home to 10-12 million Mexican Free-tailed Bats, as well as a colony of…
WC is birding in Texas. The state may be pretty weird, but the birding is excellent and with the help of our skilled guide, Sam Woods of Tropical Birding, we’ve found a lot of the birds that are hard to find anywhere else. They weren’t all that easy to find in Texas, either, but we…
WC did a post on Thailand’s shorebirds a few weeks back, complaining that Shorebirds are Hard. Bad news, patient readers; these shorebirds are even harder. Here’s a selection from the Pak Thale region of Thailand, showing off a few of the reasons that area is world famous as a place to view shorebirds. No, that’s…
This Trogon is different than the five that came earlier. This is an Asian species, not one of the Neotropic birds. Trogons are found on four continents: Eurasia, North America, South America and Africa, narrowly missing Australia. This is the Orange-breasted Trogon, one of six species of Trogon found in Thailand. While the tails are…
The late Dave Carter wrote “The Gentle Arms of Eden” more than 20 years ago. Carter died much too young, in 2002, just 49 years old, in the arms of his partner and collaborator, Tracy Grammer. Grammer and Jim Henry live-streamed a memorial concert featuring Carter’s songs recently, and closed the two hour set with…
For parts of two summers, in 1965 and 1966, WC worked as a camp counsellor for the Boy Scout camp at Lost Lake, 65 miles southeast of Fairbanks. One of a camp counsellor’s duties was to accompany a Boy Scout troop as they made day hikes and overnight hikes away from the scout camp. In…
In a testament to Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy’s incompetency, he has left WC on his email list even though (1) WC has not for six years now been registered to vote in Alaska, (2) WC has heartlessly mocked, dissected and ridiculed Mikey’s email messages and, (3) WC would eat broken glass on the Capitol steps…
A business is financially bankrupt when its liabilities exceed its assets, and it is unable to pay its debts as they come due. A political party, by contrast, is intellectually bankrupt when its election platform consists of nothing but lies and illusions. Such a political party has run out of substantive ideas, and has had…
This is an adult Yellow-bellied Marmot, photographed in the rock gardens (“Petrified watermelons here!”) near the floor of the Snake River Canyon in the Thousand Springs area. He or she – it’s hard to tell with marmots – kept a close eye on WC, the three kids and a Bald Eagle perched in a tree…
If you are a birder, and have birded in Costa Rica, you will recognize the name Alexander Skutch. Maybe you’ve even been lucky enough to visit his home, Los Cusingos. If you are a Costa Rican, he’s something of a national hero, even though he was an ex-pat American. Otherwise, the name of this pioneer…
Birds of the World (paywalled) has this to say about Black-throated Trogons: The Black-throated Trogon is widely distributed and is fairly common across its range. Nonetheless, many aspects of its natural history are poorly known. There is no information on such topics as life span and survivorship, dispersal, population regulation, molts, territoriality and population density.…
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has created a humanitarian crisis and the Russian army has demonstrated the very worst practices of an occupying force.1 The undeclared war and the attendant Russian atrocities and war crimes have made Vladimir Putin has made his nation pariahs. But the thing to remember is that Russia has long been…
WC’s recent trip to Thailand was focused on birds, of course, but we did see other critters, too, and photos were taken. Here’s a quick look at some of the mammals we encountered. Impossibly cute, with those google eyes and “Got Milk” mustache, silk fur and fearless attitude, Dusky Langurs are fairly common. Gibbons are…
Both of Idaho’s U.S. Senators, Jim Risch and Mike Crapo, voted against confirmation of District of Columbia Circuit Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. So did Alaska’s U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan. The question WC has is why? Why did they vote against confirmation of a highly qualified, former public…
“Waders” is WC’s imprecise, unscientific term for the families of birds that make their living wading, mostly in still water, and stabbing fish and invertebrates for their food. The waders, for WC, encompasses everything from Great Egrets down to herons and bitterns. Let’s wade in to a sampling of waders. Storks are cosmopolitan; while North…
WC and his readers need a break from Thai birds and Trogons. And certainly need a break from war and politics. It’s Spring Migration. WC headed out into the hills recently to see who had arrived. Here’s a report. WC finally has access to his favorite Sage Grouse lek. But whether it was the lateness…
The Anchorage Daily News has yet another opinion piece from Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy. WC likes the Binkley family, who own the newspaper, but cautions them they’re going to need to invest in case lots of Chapstick™ if they continue to give Alaska’s Least Competent Governor a platform. In his latest essay, Dunleavy’s quest for…
When WC took this photo back in 2009, this was a Chocò Trogon, or, less commonly, a White-eyed Trogon. Now it’s officially a Blue-tailed Trogon, another member of the Trogonidae. In 2009, WC’s camera was an Olympus E-3; it wasn’t very good was awful in low light conditions. And the understory of the cloud forest…
There’s a long list of birds that are hard to photograph for one reason or another. But, in WC’s experience, woodpeckers are on the short list of species that are consistently difficult. Not always in the same way, either. What follows are the best photos WC got of woodpeckers on his trip to Thailand. Not…
Kelly Tshibaka, the Trump-endorsed candidate running against U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski (R, Alaska) in the Alaska Republican primary, has an opinion piece on March 28, 2022 in the Washington Times, the Capital’s right-wing newspaper. It reads like something that might have been written by Anchorage’s Art Hackney, attempting to press all of the ultra-conservative buttons…
Several of WC’s readers have suggested the the identification of Old World Leaf Warblers, the family Phylloscopidae, isn’t that hard. Four different times, our excellent guide couldn’t determine which of three species of Leaf Warbler – Blyth’s, Claudia’s or Davison’s – we were looking at. Even with photos showing field marks, not just our guide…
Sadly, yes. But WC does not intend a sharp turn to the right.
If Dr. Eastman and President Trump’s plan had worked, it would have permanently ended the peaceful transition of power, undermining American democracy and the Constitution. If the country does not commit to investigating and pursuing accountability for those responsible, the Court fears January 6 will repeat itself. Eastman v. Thompson et al., Case No. 8:22-cv-00099-DOC-DFM,…
Owls are notoriously difficult for birders to find. Nocturnal, specializing in stealth and, outside of mating season, absolutely silent, they are never easy. Tropical owls, mostly roosting in the daytime in the densest part of the tangles and thickets of a tropical forest, might be the hardest. Even when they do call – at Baan…
In 2010, when WC took this photo of the strikingly handsome bird, it was officially a Violaceous Trogon. Today, it is an Amazonian Trogon, the former Violaceus Trogon having been split into three different species. The Amazonian Trogon is the species on the easterly side of the Andes, pretty much co-extensive with Amazonian Basin. Ornithology…
At the insistence of a reader, WC visited some of the archived QAnon sites recently. WC did so with his browser in Private Mode, and his personal IP Address blocked from prying eyes, because you just never know. After a while, the claims of Q started to make a weird kind of sense. For example,…
Wickersham's Conscience 