Mist and blooms

The bad weather continues here in southern Saskatchewan. It has been raining on and off for the last several days, keeping us from getting any substantial amount of work done. I awoke yesterday to a fog so thick I could feel the miniscule droplets of water on my skin. I didn't want to check nests in such weather, fearing the cold humidity would immediately drench any chick left unprotected, but all our nests needed to be checked. We waited a bit for the fog to lift somewhat, then headed out, with the threat of rain hanging over our heads the whole while.

Certain organisms out here are definitely thriving in the moist conditions. As I walked across the community pastures, I spotted more mushrooms than I have ever seen out here. They appear to lie dormant in the ground until enough water arrives, then they sprout up like so many miniature umbrellas, shielding the ground beneath.

As the season progresses, new flowers have come into bloom. Golden bean plants line the roads and spread across the uplands, bringing vibrant color to the drab landscape. Occasionally interspersed with these are smooth goat's beard, lending their own beautiful blue highlights to the scene.

I have begun to see more and more primrose, which will soon blanket the bare areas with their showy petals. They like to grow in disturbed areas, so these too can be seen along the roads out here.

While some are reaching the peak of their short seasonal lives, others are reaching the end. The prairie crocuses, some of the earliest bloomers, have already shed their petals and become "prairie smoke."

Everyone I look out here, I can see signs of both life and death. Often I will come across remains like this skull and mandible of a Richardson's ground squirrel.

Yet life always continues. Our searches for nests have been going very well, and a couple (both Horned Larks) have fledged chicks already. Today we found 4 nests in a single nest plot, which is about the most we can hope to find. One of them was this Sprague's Pipit nest.

Sprague's Pipits make good mothers. They sit tight on their nest until almost stepped upon. Once the intruder has left, they immediately return. Pipits build their nests in fairly dense vegetation, making a sort of "tunnel" that leads to a cup overhung with a roof. They lay 5 eggs that are whitish-brown covered with brown speckles. These birds are classified as "threatened" in Canada, mostly due to the loss of their prairie breeding habitat. Luckily they are common here, and with any walk you will be presented with the sound of the male's descending song as he displays high up in the air.

Flooded plains

Today I woke up to a beautiful day (late of course, due to the electricity's habit of turning off and on). It wasn't until my crew was ready to go that we discovered the road we take to the pastures was completely washed out due to all the rain.

There were only two nests to check in the high community pastures, which are accessible by another road. As for myself, there were 6 nests to check in the closest pasture. Since the road was off limits, I decided to just walk there. Streams that are uncrossable by ATV can sometimes be crossed by foot, if you don't mind getting a little wet. In my case, I got a LOT wet.

The prairie is more flooded than I've ever seen it. The ephemeral wetlands that have sprung up are beautiful in their own way, though I'm glad none of the nests were drowned in them. The downside, however, is the army of mosquitoes that seem to have hatched overnight.

On my walk, I travelled through a section of the community pastures I've never been through before. It was clear the ground had once been plowed for some crop or other. It was a sad sight, as the entire area had been over-run with crested wheatgrass, which is invasive. The original prairie flora had not re-colonized the area, and it was a somber reminder that this monoculture is all that may remain of native prairies if invasives are allowed to over-run.

I was pleased to find that one of the Horned Lark nests now has three fuzzy nestlings in it. These chicks are probably 2-3 days old, since their eyes are already partly open and they are able to beg for food. The dark spots inside the mouth are characteristic of Horned Lark chicks. Though you can't tell, there are actually 3 chicks in this nest.

Once the chicks hatch, the parents will remove the eggshell fragments and deposit them far from the nest. The less evidence, the less chance a predator will find the nest. Occasionally I'll find these eggshell bits lying amongst the rocks and biocrust of the prairie. This one likely came from a sparrow nest.

The sky was absolutely beautiful today. The wispy clouds were making fantastic shapes, unmarred by buildings, jet trails, and other signs of human habitation. Saskatchewan is nicknamed the "Land of Living Skies," and the title is very fitting. In fact, Grasslands National Park was recently named one of the top Dark Sky Preserves in Canada, due to its magnificent night skies.

Tomorrow is supposed to rain again, so not much hope of getting out. Even if the weather stays nice, it'll take a couple of hot sunny days to dry up the streams enough for us to take the vehicles anywhere.

Rainy days

It has been a very wet couple of days out here in Grasslands, raining nonstop from Monday night through this afternoon. About 2 inches of rain fell, making the roads impassable and leaving the lowlands more flooded than I've ever seen them. This is the current view from right outside our house.




Friday night we meant to drive to Val Marie for wing night, but impending rain meant we only made it as far as Mankota. We had a pretty nice dinner at the restaurant/inn, and on the way home we spotted a swift fox. It was only the briefest glance, but the small size and black-tipped tail let us know it wasn't a red fox. Swift foxes were once completely eliminated from this area, but the park re-introduced them a few years back. This is the first one I've seen, and hopefully I'll get a better look later on.

Saturday a few of us took a trip to Moose Jaw for some groceries. Though Mankota and Val Marie both have stores, they are small and the selection is very limited (and expensive). Occasionally we take these trips into a larger town in order to stock up. Moose Jaw, at 2 1/2 hours away, is our closest center of "civilization." Normally we make it an all-day trip, but this time the rain made the trip a relatively brief one.

On the way to Moose Jaw, we were stopped by two ranchers moving their cattle. It's a pretty awesome sight, watching the cowboys rounding up their herd.




Monday morning my nest crew took advantage in the short lull between rainstorms, and checked some nests. We have now dragged 13 plots, which means we are halfway done with our first round. There are 26 plots in total, and last year we only had the time and people to complete two rounds. This year, though, we're already well on our way to completing three rounds. We have already found 32 nests (about 20 of which we are monitoring), which is FAR ahead of last year.

While out checking nests, I saw a female pronghorn with something moving at her side. Looking closer, I saw it was a coyote. The pronghorn was chasing the coyote away from her, wary of his presence. I then noticed a group of about six Marbled Godwits about 100 meters away, making quite a racket. They all took wing, and I looked up to see that a Ferruginous Hawk had spooked them. I was struck again by the wild beauty of this place as I found myself completely surrounded by all these amazing creatures, each going about their lives just as I was.

I'm hoping to get outside and work tomorrow, as Thursday is supposed to rain again. I know it's sentimental and not very scientific of me, but I always worry a bit about the nests when the weather is bad. Luckily it serves to remind me again how tough nature really is. Even if a nest fails, female songbirds will begin building a new nest just a couple days after. Life always finds a way, even out here on the unforgiving prairie.

...And here we go

I am very happy to report that nesting has really picked up in the last couple days. That seems to be how to goes. You find nothing... nothing... then suddenly they all start at once. We've now found a total of 16 nests. Most have been Horned Lark nests so far, so I've decided to put them back in my study. I monitored them last year, but we only found a total of 9 nests, so this year I decided to leave them out. Nine just isn't enough for good statistical analysis. But seeing as we're finding more this year (and we have the time to do it), I've decided to start monitoring them again.

Horned Larks typically lay 3 eggs (though we've found 4), light-colored with small brown speckles completely covering them. They like to nest in very open areas with sparse vegetation. Their nest is an open cup with no roof, typically placed next to a tuft of grass or cow patty. Though the nests are easy to see, they can sometimes be hard to find, as the female will often run along the ground for up to 10 meters or more before flushing. That means you're looking for the nest where the bird flushed, rather than where it actually is.

Today, while rope dragging in one of the Mankota community pastures, I was thrilled to have us find 2 McCown's Longspur nests! Last year we only found 5, two of which were outside my study sites. To find 2 of them in the same plot, on the same day, within about 100 meters of each other, is pretty exciting. McCown's Longspurs are classified as a "species at risk" under Canada's Species at Risk Act (SARA). They have seen a 98% population decrease since 1968, mostly due to the loss and degradation of their breeding habitat. They are endemic to North American prairies, so no prairies equals no McCown's. This goes for many other plant and animal species out here as well.

McCown's Longspurs typically lay 3-4 eggs. Their nests and eggs are almost identical to Chestnut-collared Longspurs, as are the females. The only way to tell the nests apart are by the slight difference in markings on the birds' tails. So if you never get a good look at the adult's tail when it's flushing, you can't identify the nest.

Longspur nests are my favorites. Like Horned Larks, they prefer nesting in open, sparse areas. Their nest is an open cup, again usually placed near a tuft of grass or rock. Unlike the larks, though, longspur eggs have less markings on them, some of which are distinct squiggly lines.

Yesterday I gave the nest crew the day off, and Amy and I decided to go adventuring a bit. We ended up taking a road I've never taken before, and found ourselves outside the park. We came to an almost badlands-type area, with strange mounds of barren dirt rising out of the ground.

On the way back, we got some great looks at a (possibly female) pronghorn antelope. Despite their name, they're actually related to goats, and are the fasted land mammal in North America. Apparently they used to be prey for the now-extinct North American cheetah. Pronghorns are absolutely beautiful animals, and it always makes my heart soar to watch them racing across the prairie.

We also found a new friend while crossing a stream... Western painted turtles are pretty common out here.

We're definitely ahead of schedule for finding nests and dragging plots compared to last year. I suppose having twice the number of people on the nest crew doesn't hurt :)

Early summer days

The last few days have been absolutely beautiful. Out in the sun it's been in the 70's, which I declare to be justified tank-top weather. We've gotten three plots dragged already, which is ahead of last year. Unfortunately, we haven't been finding much. Not beyond a couple of Horned Lark nests. They're very early nesters, and will often have eggs before other species have begun laying. Horned Larks like to build nests in very open, bare ground, often with only a tuft of grass (or less) for cover. When disturbed, they will sometimes run 10 meters or more along the ground before flushing, making their nests more difficult to find. They typically lay 3-4 (sometimes 5) eggs.





Someone asked me to explain rope dragging, so here goes. It is a method developed awhile back to help researchers find nests in a large area. It can only be done in open areas like prairies. The process involves dragging a 20-meter long rope (weighted down with rock-filled cans) back and forth across the ground. The sound of the cans, as well as the rope passing by overhead, scares a bird into flushing from its nest. The grass is thick enough that the rope passes through without harming the nest or eggs. It simply causes the bird to flush, allowing us to see where the general area of the nest is. Even so, most nests are ridiculously difficult to find. They have to be, in order to prevent them being found easily by predators, like this Richardson's ground squirrel.




The area around here has a rich history, from early First Nations people, to homesteaders struggling to scrape a living from the harsh prairie sod. Evidence of their passing can be seen from time to time.




Besides the decades- and sometimes centuries-old signs of human habitation, there are often bones left behind by animals (mainly cows and deer) that lived and died here. Sometimes these remains resemble a sort of graveyard, with the only signs of life being the teeth-marks left by coyotes.




Some of the flowers have also begun to bloom. The nice thing out here is that each flower blooms at a different time during the summer, meaning that each week there is a different brush of color against the brownish-green background.

The migrant sparrows at our feeder all seem to have left for the next stage of their long journey. The grackles and cowbirds have still been gorging, though. Likely they'll continue to be daily visitors for the remainder of the summer. Yesterday a Vesper Sparrow stopped by. They breed here in the prairies, and are one of my study species. Out here, they are distinguished from the other 7 or so sparrow species by the dark cheek with a lower white border.

I was also asked to define what a life bird (or lifer) is. It is a term used by birders to recognize a species they have never seen before. Typically the "rules" are that it has to be wild, alive, and unrestrained to be counted. Many birders keep life lists, to keep track of how many species they have seen. Many different types of lists can be kept, including North American, country, state/province, county, town, or even backyard lists. Year lists are common as well. Typically I only keep a life and North American list, though since coming to Canada I've also kept Manitoba and Saskatchewan lists. My life list currently stands at 441, while my Saskatchewan list is 108 (over 30 of which were lifers!).

Tomorrow my crew will go out and drag another plot. The nests we are hoping to find belong to these species: Baird's Sparrow, Savannah Sparrow, Vesper Sparrow, Chestnut-collared Longspur, McCown's Longspur, and Sprague's Pipit.

Commence nest dragging!

Today we finally broke our house-bound streak and went out into the sunshine. It was a beautiful day: warm, sunny, with just a slight breeze (which is rare on the prairies, where gusty winds are the norm).


I took Josh (the nest camera guy) and my assistants into the park for the first time since we've been here. Our field house is technically in the Mankota community pastures. The park is a few kilometers down the road. I was really excited to show them around a bit, because I love the park and I think it's absolutely beautiful.



We rope dragged one of my nest plots, but found no nests. Just walking around beforehand, though, I found a Western Meadowlark nest, and Amy found what we think was an abandonded Sharp-tailed Grouse nest with 13 eggs in it. Neither of those are species I'm studying, so the data isn't very useful. I think we'll wait another day or two before dragging again. In the meantime, we'll probably practice more bird ID out in the field.



Meanwhile, the birds have discovered our feeder with a vengeance! In just a few short days, we've gone from no birds to over a dozen at a time.



I've never seen so many White-crowned Sparrows before. They're only migrating through, but there have been dozens of them hanging around the shelter belt and the feeder.



Even more exciting, there have been several Harris's Sparrows hanging around. I had only seen one before this, and that one was in winter plumage. A Harris's in full breeding plumage is a stunning thing to see.




There has also been a Lincoln's Sparrow or two, a Spotted Towhee, a House Finch (apparently very rare in this area), a Brown Thrasher, and oodles of Common Grackles, Brown-headed Cowbirds, and Red-winged Blackbirds. Here you can see the cowbirds on top, the blackbirds (all females) on the bottom.



I hope the snow is gone for good, and look forward to more beautiful days like this. I just hope the nesting picks up soon.

Migration continues

Most of today has been spent getting the new crew members used to the field station and going over protocol. Our full crew now includes:

Maggi - a 2nd-season grad student who acts as field manager. Studying the differences in bison and cattle grazing on songbird diversity. Originally from near Buffalo, NY.

Alexis - a 1st-season grad student studying the effects of wildfires on songbird diversity. Originally from near Ottawa, Ontario.


Tonya - a 2nd-season incoming grad student studying the effects of cattle grazing on vegetation structure and diversity. Originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Adrienne - a 2nd-season incoming grad student studying the effects of bison and cattle grazing on vegetation structure and diversity. Originally from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

Emily (me) - a 2nd-season grad student studying the effects of cattle grazing on songbird nesting success. Originally from near Rochester, NY.


Josh - an incoming 1st-season grad student studying nest predation through the use of cameras. Originally from the the St. Paul/Minneapolis area.

Bonnie - an assistant on the bird/plant crew. Originally from Senkiw, Manitoba.

Chris - an assistant on the nest crew. Originally from Burlington, Ontario.

Amy - an assistant on the nest crew. Originally from Eyebrow, Saskatchewan.

Barb - an assistant on the bird/plant crew. Originally from Saskatchewan.

All of us grad students are at the University of Manitoba, studying under Dr. Nicola Koper.


Today I went over some basic nest searching and monitoring information with Amy and Chris. But beforehand we went out birding at the pond again, because it was relatively nice out (and no snow!).

There was quite a group of shorebirds, including Spotted Sandpiper, Willet, Marbled Godwit, Semipalmated and Least Sandpipers, and this Lesser Yellowlegs.



There were several Wilson's Phalaropes as well, which breed here in the prairie. Last year we found a nest. Unlike most birds, the female in this species is more colorful.

A couple times the birds would all flush, signalling the presence of a Northern Harrier overhead.

We also lucked out by spotting a couple migrating songbirds, an American Pipit and this Northern Waterthrush, both of which were life birds for me.


Unfortunately with all the meltwater from the week's snow, the creeks have risen quite a bit. Sometimes the only way across is straight through, leaving us soaked to the knees. There are many creeks criss-crossing the prairie.

Tomorrow we have to head to the West Block for some orientation training. Hopefully by Wednesday or Thursday the roads will be dry enough to get out and start looking for some nests!

Birds galore!

The bad news: still house-bound. The good news: migration is in full swing here in Grasslands! Yesterday was a (comparatively) beautiful day... the first without snow all week. Consequently, we spent a bit of time outside birding. On the road next to the shelter belt was a group of sparrows, including this Song Sparrow.





I also got some great looks at a couple Lark Sparrows, which are very handsome birds.





There's a small pond near our field house, with one of the few full-size trees around. It's always a good spot for ducks, and this time of year, it's also great for shorebirds. These Short-billed Dowitchers are a rare migrant through the northern prairies.

Also stopping by are some warblers like this Yellow-rumped Warbler, several of which have been seen near the pond and the shelter belt. Today I also saw a single Black-and-white Warbler, another rare migrant.

Some birds are residents of the pond, like this Great Horned Owl. There's a pair that successfully raised two chicks last year, and will likely nest again this year.

Another resident is this Killdeer, made popular by their broken-wing display when their nest is approached.

And even better news: yesterday I found my first nest of the year! I ran into it randomly while walking to the pond. It was a Western Meadowlark nest. It's not one of my study species, and the nest wasn't anywhere near my study sites, so it isn't data I can use. But it's still exciting, because it means the birds have definitely started nesting, even despite the bad weather. This nest had 5 eggs in it and the female was flushed from it, so obviously she didn't abandon due to the snow. It makes me even more eager to get out and start working!

The sunset was beautiful, as it typically is out here.

Blue grama grass (Bouteloua gracilis) is one of the distinguishing vegetation of the northern mixed-grass prairie. These dried seed heads from last year show the plant's distinctive "eyelash" shape.

As if to say "psyche!", I woke up to a blizzard this morning, which quickly turned into a wet, slushy drizzle. Not very fun. Driving to Mankota to direct our remaining crew members back to the house, I stopped to take photos of these Yellow-headed Blackbirds.

The foul weather seems to have brought in the falcons, because on the way to Mankota and back we saw 2 American Kestrels, a Merlin, and a Peregrine Falcon.


Well, the full crew is finally here. Hopefully in another couple days we'll actually be able to get out and start working!