Nature Moncton Nature News: June 3 2016

** Jean Renton corrects the number of chicks of the hen TURKEY photographed yesterday to eight, not six. It will be interesting to watch these chicks develop.

** Aldo Dorio photographed a NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRD [Moqueur polyglotte] in Tracadie on Thursday. There was no mate apparent, but it was intent on putting an AMERICAN CROW [Corneille d'Amérique] out of its territory. There hasn't seemed to be many reports of Mockingbirds this spring. It should have been an excellent winter for a Mockingbird.

** Pat puts out a selection of very decorative bird houses by the front picture window each year, and a family of BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEES [Mésange à tête noire] have taken one again this year. The houses are sure not what one would expect birds to go for as they are in front of a large picture window with two dogs looking out frequently and sidewalk traffic and street traffic on the other side. The hole openings are indeed the proper size at 1 1/4 inch and shavings were put in. Over a month ago we saw the Chickadee pair busy taking out shavings, and the last few days there has been constant traffic of parents going with beaks stuffed with small caterpillars, so a clutch of nestlings are no doubt growing very fast inside. It may seem like an odd place to set up housekeeping, but in fact it's probably very safe. The inexpensive decorative houses usually have a one-season lifespan!

** There have been some changes to the Nature Moncton Sparrow workshop and field trip combo set for June 11th. The revised write-up and changes are attached to today's transcript.

Workshop and Field Trip with Roger Leblanc

Saturday June 11, 2016

It’s a fact that when you are starting out in birding there are some groups of birds that are harder than others to wrap your mind or binoculars around. Some beginners don’t even want to talk about flycatchers or gulls. And it’s true that some birds could drive you to get interested in plants! But there is a much easier group of birds that still gives people a lot of problems. The sparrows or LBJs (for “little brown jobs”) are birds that are relatively easy to find, don’t tend to hide that much, show fairly good field marks, and have recognizable songs. But still, identifying them will give most people a hard time at first. Why? Well as the LBJ nickname suggests they don’t have a lot of colors, they are relatively close to each other in size and there are a fair number of species to pick from.

But don’t despair -- help is on the way. Nature Moncton is offering a hands-on workshop on sparrows. Starting with a short one-hour indoor refresher on the sparrows of NB we will then head outdoors to the Riverview Marsh and beyond where we will concentrate on sparrows to try to put in practice what you have learned inside. The objective will be to find in the field as many as we can of the 7 or 8 species that can be found fairly easily in the region at this time of the year. Our own Roger Leblanc will lead this workshop / outing and will share with us the tricks of the trade that he has honed over the years for putting names on the pesky LBJ’S. Things like song, habitat, behavior and head pattern will be pointed out and studied in the hope that the LBJs will become ETCs (easy to call).

And in addition to sparrows, there are always many more other birds, including lots of waterfowl, on the marsh – so we may be surprised by other interesting species!

Saturday June 11, 8:00 to 9:00 (workshop); 9:30 to 12:00 (field)

**Workshop will be held in Community room at the Riverview Sobey’s, 1160 Findlay Blvd., Riverview

Registration with Louise Nichols at nicholsl@eastlink.ca or phone Louise at 939-5054.

Cost of workshop/field trip is $8 payable at the door . All are welcome, Nature Moncton member or not.

** This week's Sky-at-a-Glance is added to this transcript, courtesy of Curt Nason.

This Week’s Sky at a Glance, June 4 – June 11
With a new Moon this weekend it is a good time to take binoculars to a
rural area and search for some fuzzy Messier objects. It is late evening
before it really gets dark so you might as well greet the midnight hour.
Below Saturn is the bright orange star Antares at the heart of Scorpius.
The large globular cluster called M4 is within a bino field to its right
but you will have better luck if you keep the star out of the view. A
fainter globular cluster, M80, is about halfway between Antares and the
upper star of the arc of three that makes the scorpion’s claws.

East of Scorpius is the Teapot asterism of Sagittarius. Follow the two
stars at the top of the spout an equal distance to the right for the
pretty open cluster M6, the Butterfly Cluster. Can you see the butterfly
in this group of stars? From here, follow the angle of the Teapot’s
spout down to M7, another open cluster. Open, or galactic, clusters form
within the same vast cloud of gas and dust, and eventually radiation
from the new stars clears the remaining dust to leave a family of stars.

To see one of these stellar nursery clouds, go from the bottom star of
the spout through the midpoint of the top of the spout, and extend that
an equal distance to M8, the Lagoon Nebula. You can see this as a hazy
patch with the naked eye. Just above M8 is a smaller and fainter cloud
called M20, the Trifid Nebula, and the nearby open cluster M21. You are
scanning through the Milky Way here, so if you have the time you can
kill a couple of hours binocular-touring through our galaxy.

This Week in the Solar System

Saturday’s sunrise in Moncton is at 5:30 am and sunset will occur at
9:06 pm, giving 15 hours, 36 minutes of daylight (5:38 am and 9:08 pm in
Saint John). Next Saturday the Sun will rise at 5:28 am and set at 9:10
pm, giving 15 hours, 42 minutes of daylight (5:36 am and 9:12 pm in
Saint John).

The Moon is new at midnight Saturday evening. By the end of the week it
will yield great views of its craters in a spotting scope. Jupiter, Mars
and Saturn are above the horizon at sunset and high enough for good
observing by 11 pm. See if you can catch the volcanic moon Io emerging
from Jupiter’s shadow around 9:50 pm on Wednesday. If you like to watch
the International Space Station (ISS) this week gives lots of
opportunities. The extended twilight hours near summer solstice allows
night owls to see three or four passes from late evening to early
morning. At an altitude of 400 kilometres it orbits the earth in an hour
and a half. Visit the Heavens-Above Web site for information on when and
where to look.

The Saint John Astronomy Club meets at the Rockwood Park Interpretation
Centre this Saturday at 7 pm. All are welcome to attend at no charge.

Questions? Contact me at nasonc@nbnet.nb.ca

nelson@nb.sympatico.ca

Nelson Poirier,

Nature Moncton