Nature Moncton Nature
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The camera on the peregrine
falcon nest box on the summit of Assumption Place is now live. When
checking the link to watch the activity, scroll down to the first large image,
which shows what is happening in real time.
We are now fairly
convinced that the peregrine family consists of 4 nestlings, even though the
parents are still spending most of the time trying to keep that information
from us!
Georges Brun captured some
documentary screenshots that seem to convincingly show 4 beaks with an
insatiable appetite.
https://www.zoodemagnetichillzoo.ca/nest-cam
**The recording of the
excellent presentation given by Becky Graham at Tuesday night’s Nature Moncton
meeting on moose is now available for those who may have missed it or want to
watch it again. It is very informative.
Thank you to Brian Stone
for recording it. The recording shows the slideshow with Becky’s clear narration
in the background.
Susan Richards comments, “There
was an interested group at the Nature Moncton presentation on Tuesday, May
19, to hear Becky Graham share information from the moose surveillance in and
around Fundy National Park. There were many questions and some stories of
moose interactions from those attending the meeting. Thank you, Becky
Graham.”
**Mac and Brenda Wilmot
have an American robin pair nesting in the rafters at the sugar shack
behind their Lower Coverdale home. They have a blink camera pointed at the
nest. The video clip was at 6:30 am on Tuesday morning. The first video
shows the mother getting breakfast in bed, and the second shows that both have been busy
feeding the new crew.
(Editor’s note: It seems amazing
to think that the robins are raising young already. It seems like they just
arrived from migration!)
**David Lilly went to the
Oromocto wetland on Wednesday and was surprised to see a Virginia rail.
However, the highlight was three sora that allowed him to get some great
photos.
David also photographed a pink
lady’s slipper, which appears to be the white morph.
**Isaac Acker was able to
photograph some amphibians last week in Riverview out of a selection of spring peeper,
American toad, green frog, red eft stage of eastern newt, and an
eastern red-backed salamander.
**David and Anita Cannon experienced a flurry of bees very actively moving about an impressive patch of rhododendron on Wednesday. The bees were moving at such a rapid pace from bloom to bloom that it was very difficult to photograph one. Anita was able to get a documentary photo of one of the many eastern bumblebees with its signature dark abdomen and dark spot on the thorax.
**In early May, John Massey
had a bee arrive to his bee house that he has been operating successfully for
some years, which looked different from what he had ever seen before and larger.
It has taken some time to
get a confirmed identification, but Bugguide has confirmed it is the orchard
mason bee a.k.a. blue orchard bee (Osmia lingaria).
This is one of our very
early nesting solitary bees that nests in tubes or natural holes and reeds,
creating cells for its brood with mud dividers. It is prized for its efficiency in pollinating fruit trees. Note the blue body and yellow furry face in John’s
photograph to help with identification.
**On Monday, Brian Stone
drove to Dorchester to hopefully locate the rare egret seen there the day
before, but had no luck. But while he was there, he did see a few interesting
birds and other subjects, including a pair of Wilson's phalaropes,
several bobolinks, a common yellowthroat, and a few swarms of gnats
and mayflies. A male northern harrier hawk was performing acrobatic
displays in the sky, possibly to impress a female hawk that was flying around
nearby.
After leaving Dorchester, Brian visited the lagoons at Memramcook and photographed a pair of northern
shoveler ducks, a tree swallow perching on a nest box, a cute mallard
duck family, and an eastern forktail damselfly. Further along at
Haute-du-Ruisseau Park, Brian found red trilliums still blooming and
ferns opening up. In a ditch beside the trail, he was photographing green
frogs and tadpoles (so many tadpoles) when he noticed one of the
green frogs had a blue tint to it, possibly making it a rare blue morph
variety. When the blue-tinted frog moved to a different spot, Brian suddenly
noticed that there was a medium-sized garter snake floating in the
ditch, likely waiting for something to eat to come along. The frog was
right behind the snake, in the danger zone, but the snake didn't seem to notice
and soon moved on. Brian named the photo after a song ... "Looking
for lunch in all the wrong places".
On the muddy bank along
the creek at Haute-du-Ruisseau Park, a swarm of tiny, 8mm-long ground-dwelling
bees was going in and out of tiny holes, which Brian assumed were nesting
holes. The little sweat bees were being watched by some other tiny bees
that Brian suspects were blood bees that are parasitic on the sweat
bees. Brian combined photos of a sweat bee and one of the same-sized blood
bees, which has an orange-coloured abdomen, into one photo for
comparison.
Brian then continued to
Batemans Mills, near Shediac, to search for the reported little blue heron, but
was not able to locate that bird. But ... while he was scanning for the heron,
he did come across an American Bittern that was fishing alongside the
edge of the stream bank. It was so well camouflaged that Brian could only
make it out with the binoculars. Also in the same area, a solitary sandpiper
was foraging alongside the same stream bank in a different spot.
More from Monday. Also, a
video of the small sweat bees nesting in the muddy stream bank.
Nelson Poirier
Nature Moncton
