Bird Song

whippoorwill

One of the best things about camping last weekend was listening to all the bird sounds at night and in the morning.  The first night we ate supper late. I think it was after 7 p.m.  When all was cleaned up I heard this sound and wondered, "What the heck IS that?"  The sound was almost mechanical in tone and timing.  It sounded like whip poor WILL!  Whip poor WILL!  My sister said, "Maybe it's a whippoorwill."  As soon as she said that I thought she had to be right.  She looked it up on her smart phone and played the sound.  She knows some birds but hasn't had the time or inclination to focus on them like I have.  I was amazed at her ability to figure that out so quickly.  The whippoorwill is a stunning bird to hear calling. It puts an incredible amount of energy into singing. I counted it calling it's own name 26 times in a row without stopping to take a breath.  I've read about whippoorwills in books and never imagined they sounded like that.  And I can see why people would write about such an amazing sounding night bird.  The whippoorwill is part of the nightjar family that includes nighthawks.  I've seen one night hawk and it laid horizontally on the branch just like the whippoorwill.  The whippoorwill will sit or lay on the ground all day.  They lay still until they're almost stepped on.  In the evening and in the early morning they hunt for insects and catch them on the fly.  Whippoorwills prefer a forest with an open understory.  They lay their eggs right on the forest floor.  if a predator comes near they will fake an injury just like killdeer will pretend to have a broken wing.  They nest all through out the state of Minnesota. Why have I never heard this bird before?  A friend of mine remembers hearing them in Andover in the 1970's but not recently.  The numbers of whippoorwills are decreasing to the point that they are a bird of least concern.  To hear their iconic sound go to:  http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Antrostomus_vociferus_-_Eastern_Whip-poor-will_-_XC103418.ogg 

The northern mockingbird was also thrilling to hear.  It had a lot to say and so many different ways to say it. I giggled as I heard it say one thing, two things, and then 25 different things.  It sounded like at least 20 birds all at the same time.  This is another iconic sounding bird common in literature, poems, and songs (like in "Daddy's going to buy you a)."  And then the turkeys were gobbling back and forth from one part of the park to another.  A pair of Canadian geese were swimming about in the part of the forest that was flooded by the high water of the St. Croix river.  One took off and they verbally played Marco Polo until it flew around and returned to it's mate.  Ring necked pheasants sounded off in the woods.  I was glad that the mallards quacked as they flew up river because once you hear the mallard quack, you know  it's a mallard.  There is no need to bring the binoculars up to your eyes to check because only mallards quack.  Also the flooded woods I heard a common yellow throat calling. And once we got to the upper forest by the parking lot I heard the sound of a Eastern wood peewee.  The peewee is a sound that I memorized last year and forgot completely.  I had to listen to the sound of a dozen or more birds before I nailed it to the peewee.  Their call is a distinctive complaining tone that starts in the mid range, descends lower and rises back to mid range again - "pee-a-wee!"  There is so much to hear out in the woods.  When you are camping you don't have silly things like walls or windows or the sound of a water softener running between you and the lovely symphony of nature.