Okay.
The Wisconsin School of the Air presents Robert S. Ellerson, University of Wisconsin Extension
Specialist in Wildlife Management in the wonderful world of nature.
This series of programs designed for in-school viewing by children in grades 5-9 is televised
each Monday afternoon at 2 o'clock by University of Wisconsin Television.
Now Robert Ellerson and the wonderful world of nature.
Hi boys and girls. Today we're going to be talking about some of our winter birds.
You'll recall that during the past several weeks we've been talking about mammals,
and how important the habitat was to these mammals.
By habitat of course we met the place where the mammals lived or their environments,
in other words we used for habitat.
Now we're going to see today whether winter birds need special habitats too.
I wonder if any of you have ever thought about the marvel of birds living in our very cold winter climate,
all winter long with us in temperatures down below zero in cold and sweet and snow.
And these little feathered creatures, some of them laying not more than just a couple of pennies,
are able to live successfully in this winter climate that we have here in Wisconsin.
Certainly this is one of the great wonders and marvels of nature.
Now what birds do we have with us here in the winter time?
We all know that birds are not as numerous in Wisconsin in the winter time as they are in the summer time.
Many of the common birds such as the robin and the blue bird and the killed here and the black birds
all go south in the winter time and they're not found here at this time of the year.
But there are a certain number of birds which spend their winters with us.
Now what birds are these?
Some of these birds are birds that we call permanent residents.
In other words, they are birds that live here in Wisconsin the year around.
Things like the blue jay, the crow, the chickadee, nut hatch are all birds which live in Wisconsin the year around.
Some of the birds that we have here in the winter time are birds we call winter residents.
In other words, they are birds that are found here only in the winter time.
Mostly they are birds that make their summer homes in the lands lying north of Wisconsin
and come down and spend their winters with us.
Now this brings us to one of the very important differences between birds and mammals.
Most mammals do not have the ability to travel very far or very fast.
Birds on the other hand have the power of flight.
And so are much more mobile creatures than are mammals.
And you recall that certain mammal ranges, mammals such as the pocket gopher and the mole,
and even the cotton tail rabbit had very small home ranges.
The cotton tail has a home range of just a couple of acres
and the home range of a mammal like the mole may not be more than 75 or 100 yards across at the very most.
Now any bird can fly across an area of this size in a matter of a fraction of a second, of a fraction of a minute.
But does this great mobility make any difference as far as the bird's habitat is concerned?
Let's take a look at some of the places where birds are found in the winter time.
One of the places, one of the habitats of winter birds are the woodlands or the marshland areas.
And in this picture we can see a winter scene with shrubs and trees in the background.
In the foreground, the snowy foreground is actually a lake shore.
And the picture was taken from out on the ice.
But you see in the winter time there is really no such thing as a wetland habitat because these areas are all frozen over.
As far as birds are concerned, really there are only two types of habitat in the winter time.
There are the areas that are covered with brush or with trees.
In other words, the wooded habitats and those areas which lack brush or trees are the open areas.
Now let's get back to our woodlands and take a look at some of the birds which are commonly found in the woodlands.
In the picture that you will see we have a number of common winter birds.
Up at the top of the picture, the two birds that are being pointed at now are two now are chickadees.
These black cap chickadees are some of our very common winter birds.
They are permanent residents found here the year around.
And I am sure that any of you that are familiar with this bird are familiar with its cheery little song,
the little chickadee dee dee, chickadee dee dee, the little song that gives the bird its name, chickadee.
Now immediately below the chickadee are two other birds which are very common winter birds.
These are nut hatches. They too are permanent residents.
They have a kind of a nasal yank, yank, yank call.
And we see them upside down and crawling around, hopping around on the tree branches,
finding the eggs of insects and the dormant insects that they use as food.
Over on the left of the picture are two little red breasted nut hatches.
These birds are not very common in Wisconsin in the winter time, although we occasionally do see them.
In the winter time, birds are mostly rather sociable creatures.
And we find flocks of them traveling about the countryside.
As a matter of fact, sometimes we find mixed flocks of these birds in the woodland.
Flocks made up of chickadees, nut hatches, and some of the woodland woodpeckers.
And of course all woodpeckers are more or less closely associated with woods.
And here in Wisconsin we have two woodpeckers that are very common in the winter time.
And this picture shows these common winter woodpeckers.
Over on the right are two rather small little woodpeckers that are called downy woodpeckers.
They have very tiny thin little beets.
On the left is a larger woodpecker that colored almost identically with the downy woodpeckers.
And this larger woodpecker is called a hairy woodpecker.
We have here a mounted specimen of a hairy woodpecker.
And you can see that this bird has rather a large bill for a bird of its size.
And the males of both the downy and the hairy woodpecker have a little red cap on the back of their head.
The females lack this red coloration.
These birds of course feed on the insects and other life that they find beneath the bark of trees.
Another very common woodland bird is this large hawk that I have right here.
This is a Cooper's hawk.
It is a bird which is more or less restricted to woodlands.
In the winter time we see some hawks out in the open.
But most frequently we find the Cooper's hawk right in the forest.
The Cooper's hawk is a very fast flying hawk.
And its food consists largely of other birds.
Along with the Cooper's hawk in the woodlands we also find certain owls.
The barred owl and the horned owl.
The screech owl and occasionally the tiny little saw wet owl.
Now these are just a few of the birds which are dependent on woodlands for their habitat.
Now what about the other types of habitat that are available to birds in the winter time?
The next type of habitat that we would like to talk about are the open fields.
And here we see a picture of a Wisconsin countryside in the winter time showing the open snow covered fields with a farmstead in the background.
Notice that there is very little cover in this woody cover.
There are really very very few birds to be found in these open farmland, open field types of situations.
As a matter of fact sometimes you can drive for many miles through the countryside in the winter time without seeing birds of any kind.
However there is one bird which is all was found in this open country.
It is a bird that winters in Wisconsin occasionally.
It is a bird we call the horned lark.
And this picture shows a group of these horned larks.
Notice that they have little tiny horns on their heads, their feathers of course.
And these birds are found only in the open country.
Just the other week I drove into Milwaukee and both on the way in and coming back.
I saw over 50 of these little birds along the road sides in small flocks.
Now there is still another type of bird which is not associated with any particular type of habitat here in Wisconsin in the winter time.
And this group of birds I call the wandering birds.
We are apt to see them in quite a variety of situations.
We may see them out in the open. We may see them along the edges of the woods or sometimes right in the woods themselves.
Two of the very common birds in this group are the tree sparrow and the slate color junk jungle.
The tree sparrow here is shown on the left and the junkos on the right of this picture.
The junko is a little slate colored bird with the white outer tail feathers
which I am sure many of you are familiar with.
The tree sparrow has a little reddish cap and a black spot right in the middle of an otherwise clear grey breast.
Very easy birds to identify.
These birds are always found in little flocks.
Both of these birds are winter residents.
In other words they make their homes north of Wisconsin in the summer time and just come down and spend their winters with us.
They are both belong to the sparrow family and their food consists largely of the seeds of weeds.
Still another bird which we could classify as a wanderer is the common crow.
And I am sure that all of you have seen crows out around in open fields feeding on crop residues
and certainly all of you have seen crows in trees and in the woods.
So if two is a bird that is not confined to any particular type of habitat in the winter time.
Now our last group of birds are the birds which are more or less closely associated with man and man's buildings.
And two birds which I know all of you know that belong to this group are the common starling and the English sparrow.
These two birds are neither of them are native Wisconsin birds.
Both of them are European birds that were introduced here and wherever we see them we can always be sure that we are near some works of man.
If we are out in the country we commonly see them around farm buildings and we commonly see them around cities.
Now one of our native birds which is very common around cities particularly in the winter time is the cardinal.
And this picture of the cardinal here shows this very beautiful bird with the bright red color, the bright red beak, the crest on its head.
And the cardinal is one of the very first birds to start singing in the spring of the year.
As a matter of fact they usually start their song in the latter part of January.
And by February you can hear cardinal singing almost every day.
So we can see that birds do have definite habitat preferences.
Some birds prefer woodlands while other birds prefer the open fields and still others are wandering birds which use both the woody cover and the open fields.
Next week boys and girls we are going to be talking about some of the adaptations of birds.
And birds are particularly adapted to feeding on particular types of food.
And the things that have been adapted as far as the birds are concerned are to be the adaptations are to be found largely in the builds and in the feet of birds.
So next week we'll talk about these adaptations to particular food habits so until then so long.
Each Monday afternoon at two o'clock the Wisconsin School of the Air presents Robert S. Ellerson, University of Wisconsin specialist and wildlife management in the wonderful world of nature.
This series of programs is designed for in-school viewing by children in grades five through nine.
Next Monday at two o'clock our television classroom will again view the wonderful world of nature and we invite you to join us there.