Nature Moncton Nature News: March 11 2024

NATURE MONCTON NATURE NEWS

March 11, 2024

Nature Moncton members as well as any naturalist in New Brunswick or beyond are invited to share their photos and descriptions of recent nature sightings to build a fresh (almost) daily edition of Nature News

To respond by e-mail, please address your message to the information line editor, nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com .

Please advise the editor at nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com if any errors are noted in wording or photo labelling.

For more information on Nature Moncton, check the website at www.naturemoncton.com .

Proofreading courtesy of Louise Nichols at nicholsl@eastlink.ca

** Louise Nichols, desperate to find any kind of life outside, noticed some galls on multiflora rose bushes along the trail in their Aulac woods. She harvested one of them and split it open to find some larvae inside which she was able to photograph with her macro lens. The gall was about one cm in circumference.

BugGuide suspects this to be one of the many galls made by Diplolepsis spp. This genus of gall-producing wasps are numerous. The larvae induce galls on wild roses but rarely on domestic roses.

**Norbert Dupuis photographed a male Northern Cardinal perched on a Mountain Ash in the yard of Yolande LeBlanc in Memramcook.

It gave a concert that lasted at least a couple of minutes…loud and clear and beautiful! It then sang in the forest for a couple of hours.

(Editor’s note: Nelson Poirier is also noting his one pair of Northern Cardinals start vocalizing very loudly before dawn and frequently during the day.)

Yolande’s Brown Creepers also cooperated nicely for Norbert to photograph.

**On 6 March, Richard Blaquiere checked over the gulls at the McAllister Place parking lot in Saint John and found a banded Ring-billed Gull. He was able to get enough photographs from different angles to decipher most of the numbers which were then reported to UQAM gull project. Originally banded as an adult male on 12 May 2011, this bird had also carried a uniquely marked blue plastic band (KM1) which has since been lost.

The report Richard received on the tagged bird is below. Note that the bird was banded in 2011 as an adult which would make it at least 13 years old.

Université du Quebec a Montreal

Département des sciences biologiques

2024-03-07

Mrs, Mr

that you observed on 2024-03-06

- Varennes - Québec

was banded on 2011-05-12 Age: Adult

in Saint-John

Location: Île Deslauriers

Sex: Male Band No: 0954-16681

Please note that the first letter of the code represents the band color (B = blue; J = yellow; R = red).

This marking program is conducted jointly by researchers from UQAM, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts DCR as part of a study on movements and population dynamics of Ring-billed Gulls in eastern North America. For more details,

Thank you for reporting your sightings.

gull.uqam.ca

Sighting summary for BKM1 :

The Ring-billed Gull with the colored band

Date Ville/City Lieu/Location Province / State

2012-05-30 Varennes Île Deslauriers QC

2014-05-13 Varennes Île Deslauriers QC

2024-03-06 Saint-John McAllister Place NB

Professor

Jean-François Giroux

**John Inman reports the Common Grackles have gone to over 30 and Red-winged Blackbirds have gone to over 20 in his Harvey yard.

Kevin Renton reported that Red-winged Blackbirds have just started to arrive in numbers to their Stilesville feeder yard.

Nelson Poirier also reports that a Red-winged Blackbird that stayed with him all winter was joined by a friend for the first time on Sunday.

**Gremlins nabbed Pat Gibb’s photos of her air plant that were supposed to be published yesterday. The photos have been retrieved and published today. Pat’s comments can be read by scrolling back to yesterday’s edition.

Nelsonpoirier435@gmail.com

Nelson Poirier

Nature Moncton