FBC 2.23.19 Walk

     I did the best thing ever last week.
I went on a bird walk with the Feminist Bird Club.
     I saw some of my bird friends.
I made new bird friends.
     We saw birds.
We had cooperative weather.
     I met Paul Sweet.
I toured the AMNH Ornithological specimen collection.
     I saw birds I will (sadly) never see in my life time, even if I tried.
I HAD THE BEST DAY!

A white throated sparrow is ready for its close-up.
Our walk was led by Martha, they did an amazing job sharing the birder names of areas in the park and of course, all the birds!

CLOSE-UP!
Busy foraging among the decaying leaves and twigs, grabbing some seeds or larvae hiding among the warmth that rotting stuff creates.

Undeniably cute af, this tufted titmouse is too, ready for its close-up.

These birds were quite abundant, as well as many other "common" bird friends like...

Northern Cardinals.
This female is striking. I think the females are so beautiful, if not more than the males overall-color look.

Also ridiculously common, but often overlooked, but delightfully beautiful - common grackle. They can shimmer when you get them in the light.

Before heading into the museum, a red-tail hawk is spotted on the museum.

At the American Museum of Natural History, Paul Sweet introduced us to, essentially, the bird library. The ornithological specimen collection includes skins of different preparations, eggs, and bones. Specimens can date back well over 100 years and are from all over the world. I believe Paul told us the museum has over 800,000 specimens representing species from around the world in existence and extinct.
Each bird on the above tray from the Solomons represents a different species of bird. The ones looking quite similar each hail from a different island- similar to the finches of the Galapagos.

More birds from the Solomons, including the very kingfisher that caused a stir a few years back.
Paul explained how great an importance these skins are, from DNA to aiding in research of various works from scientists around the world. Specimens can only be collected with proper permits and permissions. Their impact on our knowledge of natural history and more is priceless.

Speaking of priceless, a bird I will never see alive in my lifetime or beyond, the Ivory-billed Woodpecker.
Extinct in the United States and most likely, the wild. Very (VERY) slim chance maybe in Cuba.
Guess what caused their extinction....

The tags on each specimen provides much information from sex to collection date, to location of collection to who collected it, and more.

Trays of pittas, a type bird found in Asia/Australasia/Africa. I believe these are more from the Australasia region.

Among other extinct birds shared with us, the Great Auk (pictured). Once again, wiped out by humans.
In addition, other birds whose extinction was caused by humans that we got to view included Carolina Parakeets, Passenger Pigeon, and Imperial Woodpecker (classified as possibly extinct- but if alive, would be the worlds largest woodpecker, 2nd largest is also extinct, the Ivory-billed).
As we are in the midst of a 6th extinction, this is a real bummer to reflect back on - the excitement of seeing real birds, very dead, that I will never see in the wild or at a zoo, alive. Ever. Because us.

A collection of cowbird eggs with the host species. This was pretty cool. The cowbird egg sometimes looks pretty different from the host.

The diversity among murre eggs. So beautiful - from pure white to blue, brown speckles, black streaks - absolutely amazing.

This visit was legit a childhood and adulthood dream to participate in such a tour. The collections at the museum are even more vast than the exhibits (and there are A LOT of exhibits)! What a privilege! My thanks to Molly, Martha, and Paul for an AMAZING, dream-come-true kind of day!