Birdstrike Educational Opportunity Missed in Omaha

An Earth Day celebration was held at the Union Pacific Center in downtown Omaha on Wednesday, April 21st. Despite the rain, same time was taken to bicycle down from midtown and see what was being presented.

Tables were setup for use by a variety of companies and others promoting a suitable Earth Day related activity. They included the Omaha Pedalers, Bicycle Club, the Nature Conservancy, Omaha Public Power District, Keep Omaha Beautiful, Lowes, Whole Foods, Sierra Club, the Missouri River Recovery Program of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Sprint and others.

My particular interest was to see if there would be any information available about what Union Pacific Railroad was doing to address bird strikes at their building, where there have been numerous instances of bird mortality.

Noticed first was a sign near the escalators to the staff work areas, urging employees to turn off unnecessary lights and to keep the window blinds closed. This information is similar to that in an email sent to employees on April 16th.

UP environmental management personnel at a booth were asked if they were providing any handouts on the bird strike issue. The only thing they knew about was the new "bird crossing" signs, which they noted they had nothing to do about putting in place. One comment made was that they "try not to hand out too much."

This was at a table with lots of material to provide to attendees, and where a cloth carry bag was handed out at the doors for people use for the ample amount of material provided at the display tables.

The UP people handing out the bags wore tshirts saying, "Think Globally - Act Locally."

The company should have taken advantage of the opportunity to "Act Locally" and educate the hundreds of visitors about bird strikes and helpful measures. Especially since most of the visitors were workers in other local buildings.

It was certainly a lost opportunity.

There were about 125 people present during the time spent walking about the lobby of the building.

While there, I took the following picture of the west wall of the Union Pacific Center, which according to officials, is comprised of fritted glass. There are some small sections of this type of glass but obviously it was not entirely composed of this type of glass. The glass is not opaque and is still reflective, as noted by the neighboring structures obvious in the photograph.

It is very questionable how UP can claim this is helping to address the bird strike issue, as they did in the company email, since nothing was actually done since the glass was installed during the original construction. There have been instances of bird strikes in this vicinity of the building.

The company is also not taking the initiative and removing interior plants prominently notable on the north side of the building, which has confused many birds and led to their demise.

Anything that can be done to reduce the mortality to migratory birds is helpful, but the company can easily do more.

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According to a federal official, the reason that fritted glass would not be put in place was that it was too expensive.

On Earth Day, 22 April 2010, the news reported a company profit of $516 million for the first quarter of 2010.

It is ironic that the millions of profit were announced on this particular day, in a directly opposite perspective of what is being done to protect migratory birds that die at the Union Pacific Center. It seems blatantly obvious that profits are the main concern of the corporation, not doing what is right to avoid bird deaths at their downtown Omaha corporate headquarters!

Long-legged Birds - Whooping Crane Young and Old

You do not have any difficulty in telling a bird from any other animal; though birds among themselves show wonderful differences, yet you are never in doubt whether a particular specimen is a bird or not. Yet how great the differences between a humming-bird, not larger than some insects, and with a flight so rapid that you can hardly see its wings, and a domestic goose, which rarely flies, is awkward, in all its movements, and large enough for a dinner for a whole family. Some birds feed only on other birds, or small quadrupeds, and such other animals as they can catch; others live on insects; still others find their food in various seeds and fruits; then when we come to the sea-shore, or the great lakes, we find birds that live upon fish, which they catch in deep water, or along shore, where the water is shallow. If birds all lived upon one thing, they would soon find a scarcity of food, and it is very interesting to observe that each class of birds is so formed that it can best get its living in one particular way. A look at a hawk, with its fierce bill and powerful claws, shows that it is intended to prey upon living creatures; if a duck, with its broad, blunt bill, and clumsy web-feet, should try to carry off a young rabbit, what poor work it would make of it! It would get along no better than would a hawk if obliged to swim and dive to the bottom of the river for its dinner. Wherever we look, whether at birds, at quadrupeds, or other animals, or even at plants, we find that each and all are especially adapted to live in a certain manner, and in particular places, and it is not possible for any thinking person, even a child, to fail to see that all this has not happened by chance. Men do not build locomotives engines to run upon the water, or construct steam-boats to travel on the land, and it is very plain that the Creator designed these different forms of birds and other creatures for a particular purpose. If a naturalist is studying birds (and it is so with other departments), he finds those which get their living in a particular manner, are constructed, or built, so to speak, on a similar plan, and he groups the birds according to this plan as shown in their structure. You would not class the duck and the hen, or the pigeon and the hawk together, and while you, perhaps, could not tell at once all their differences, you know that they are fitted in their feet, their bills, and all their parts, each for a particular mode of life. Everybody, even young people, are naturalists to some extent. Those who make a special study of birds, are called ornithologists, as they study ornithology - a pretty long word, but perhaps it will not seem hard or difficult to remember if you know that it means "bird-discourse," or as we may say, "bird-talk"; the name, when it was found necessary to have one, was made from the Greek ornis, a bird, and logos, a discourse, and means the science of birds. Ornithologists differ as to the manner in which they group or classify birds, but they nearly all agree in having a group or order of Waders. These are birds with very long bill, neck and legs, and a very short tail; the leg is also bare of feathers for some distance above the lower joint, and they mostly live in marshes, or on the shores near the water. These are further divided into several sub-orders, on account of minor differences, but they all agree in the leading points here named. The Waders include birds of various sizes, from the little plovers and sand-pipers, up to the bitterns, the herons, and the cranes.

To show the general appearance of the Waders, and at the same time give the portrait of a rather rare bird, here is a picture of what is called the Whooping Crane, which is found in the States of the Valley of the Mississippi, in the Gulf States, and occasionally in the Middle States. It is one of the grandest of our native birds, it being between four and five feet long. Its plumage is entirely white, except some black on the wings, its legs are black, the head carmine. The two birds shown in the engraving, are not different cranes, but an old and a young one. The young does not appear in a white dress the first season, but goes about in modest gray and brown, and it has been mistaken for a different bird. The flight of this crane is very high and rapid, and as they pass far over head, their coarse note, which gives them the name of Whooping Crane, may be heard for a great distance. It is stated hat when mating, the male birds have severe fights, and that their cries at this time have been heard for three miles. They feed upon small fishes, frogs and other reptiles, and upon the roots of various plants that grow in muddy places. As they pass from North to South, they are said to stop on the sweet-potato fields, to search for any potatoes that may be left in digging. Travellers on the far western prairie, where the air is so peculiar that all different things are strangely magnified, tell numerous stories of being deceived by this bird. One teamster followed one of these cranes for several miles, thinking that it was a mule that had strayed from the camp; and an old hunter has been known to crawl a long distance on his belly to get a shot at what he took for an antelope, and he only found out his mistake when his antelope took wing and flew off as a Whooping Crane. They are exceedingly quick to catch the least sound, and if once alarmed, they keep on the alert. It is said that these birds were formerly found in New Jersey and other Eastern States, but they have been killed off or frightened away from all the thickly settled parts of the country. That any one should wish to kill such a noble bird, that is not useful for food, and does no harm to any one, seems not only thoughtless, but wicked. We do not envy the feelings of one who, for the sake of shooting something, can stop the flight of this beautiful white Crane, and see it drop a lifeless mass of useless flesh and blood-stained feathers. Audubon states that they become very tame in captivity, and he gives an account of the odd and suspicious ways of one that he had.

From the American Agriculturist.

Duck Shooting at Chesapeake Bay Circa. 1868

In October the various species of ducks arrive from the North, and congregate in the bays along the coast, where they find their favorite feeding grounds. Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries have long been famous for the immense flocks of wild fowl which resort to them at this season, and have become especially noted as the resort of the Canvas-back, generally esteemed the most delicious of all ducks. In our markets, when the Canvas-backs bring four dollars a pair, other kinds are sold for a dollar or less. The ducks when they arrive from the North are very poor, but they rapidly fatten after reaching their feeding grounds. The favorite food of the Canvas-backs is the Tape-grass or Eel-Grass, Vallisneria spiralis. This, which, by the way, is not a grass at all, has flat, tape-like leaves, two feet or more in length, and grows in slow streams, completely submerged. It is said that the Canvas-backs eat only the roots of this plant, while other ducks feed upon the leaves. The superiority of this species of duck is attributable to this particular food, which is in the Chesapeake called "Wild Celery," though it has no resemblance to celery, nor is it botanically related to it. A gentleman from Albemarle Sound informed me that Canvas-backs were abundant in those waters, but as they were without their proper food, "Wild Celery," they were less esteemed than some other species. It seems to be conceded that the excellence of the Canvas-back is due to the Vallisneria, and this relationship is recognized in the specific scientific name, the bird being called Anas Vallisneria. Duck shooting calls for the display of strategy, and those who follow it for sport or for profit resort to various ingenious expedients to get near the game. One of our artists sends us sketches he has taken in Chesapeake Bay, which illustrate some of the methods of hunting. Certain favored spots over which the birds pass as they fly from one feeding place to another are often rented at a high rate as shooting grounds. A point of this kind is shown in figure 1. Blinds or screens are built to hide the sportsmen who lie in wait for the birds. A nearer view of one of these blinds is given in figure 2.

Figure 1. Inlet on Chesapeake Bay.

Figure 2. Shooting from a blind or screen.

A curious way of enticing the birds within range is called toling, fig. 3. Dogs of a small breed are trained to run backwards and forwards on the shore; the dog is sometimes made more conspicuous by tying a red handkerchief around its body. The ducks, observing the motions of the dog, swim towards the shore to investigate; their curiosity being satisfied the flock sails off again. As they turn and present broadside to the sportsmen, they shoot and often kill large numbers. A different breed of dogs is employed to bring the dead game in from the water.

Among the other devices our artist has represented, is one in which the boat is converted into a rude resemblance to a huge swan, figure 4. A boat of this kind can be silently paddled within shooting distance of a flock, which is shot at through an opening in the breast of the monster.

Figure 3. Toling for ducks.

Figure 4. Masked boat.

Figure 5 represents shooting from a float or battery. A broad platform is so ballasted that it just floats upon the surface of the water, and is anchored in a place where the birds resort. The sportsman takes his position upon this, and is screened from sight by means of sedges or boughs. Decoys, to attract the birds, made of wood and painted to resemble ducks, are anchored near by. It is necessary to have an attendant in a skiff, at a distance, to pick up the birds as they are shot by the man on the float.

Night, shooting, represented in figure 6, is sometimes practised, but it is not regarded with favor by sportsmen, as the birds, if alarmed in the night, are not apt to return to the same feeding ground for a long time after being disturbed.

Figure 5. Shooting from float.

Figure 6. Night shooting.

Punt shooting, in which an enormous swivel gun is used, the discharge of which slaughters birds by the hundred, is, we believe, properly prohibited by law in the Chesapeake waters.

From the American Agriculturist.

Titmouse Pair Visits Shadow Lake, Elmwood Park

During the Sunday bird hike about Elmwood Park on 18 April, the call of a Tufted Titmouse was heard to the south of the Jones Street Bridge at Shadow Lake. There was a vagrant cat lurking, and it had disturbed the birds, enough to cause a commotion.

In looking closer there were two of the titmice to briefly appreciate before they moved further in the woods, and my route was to chase away the unwanted feline predator. It felt safe but eventually ran up to the back of a house neighboring the south side of the park.

This is the first known occurrence of this species for nearly two decades in the park environs, having last been noted some time during 1991 by Clyde Johnson and Emma Johnson, during one of their regular walks.

The other most recent observation was 2 November 1989, also by the Johnsons.

Prior to that, obviously because of the complete dearth of lookers, the only other records are from the early 1930s and prior.

They were: 31 December 1932; on 22 October 1922 when noted by Miles Greenleaf, the celebrated news editor with a great passion for birds; and, during the December 1919 to Feb 1920 period, it had also occurred.

The first notation of its occurrence, and coincidentally, also in mid-April, was 14 April 1918. The sighting was given as the first instance of the species having been noted in Omaha, according to the report issued by Greenleaf.

The Tufted Titmouse had been seen previously in the local area before, in particular in 1900 at Florence, which was north of the river city, as well as Child's Point, northeast of Bellevue, in Sarpy County, and just down river from South Omaha. It had undoubtedly made its way along the Missouri to within the Omaha boundary, especially in the timber along the bluffs, but had not been observed and noted.

In the next few years after its first Omaha occurrence, it was reported again in the hills of Florence, and in December was noted as occurring often at Turner Park, in midtown.

The two titmice seen today were a welcome sight and a wonderful addition to the current bird list for Elmwood Park and Memorial Park!

A short time later during the walk about, an American Coot was seen at Wood Creek Pond, and was the second sighting this month, surprising for a species which prior to the two current records (the other instance was two weeks ago), that had last been seen 24 April, 1996, also by Clyde Johnson and Emma Johnson.

First Birdstrike Death of 2010 Season at Qwest

The first bird-strike death of the 2010 season was found on the morning of April 18th on the west side of the Qwest Center Omaha. It was a white-throated sparrow near the box office entry towards the south end.

The mortality had just occurred as the carcass was still fresh.

This was the first survey for bird strikes in the downtown Omaha area done this year, and the earliest fresh occurrence of a bird strike in the area. Surveys in the previous two years did not get started until the latter part of April, or early May.

The sparrows death indicates a longer period of time when strikes occur at Omaha, and would also indicate a greater extent of mortality than previously projected.

Tiger Beetles Receives Endangered Species Funds

Funds for two efforts to conserve the endangered Salt Creek Tiger Beetle were announced April 12 by the Department of Interior.

The two projects would include development of a habitat conservation plan, and purchase of an additional tract of saline wetlands.

"Habitat Conservation Plan for the Salt Creek Tiger Beetle and Eastern Saline Wetlands Complex (Lancaster County, NE) $180,000. This grant award will support completion of a landscape-scale, umbrella habitat conservation plan essential to ensuring conservation of the highly imperiled Salt Creek tiger beetle and the saline wetlands habitat in rapidly expanding Lancaster County. This approach will provide a more integrated conservation strategy and better benefits to the species than multiple smaller HCPs. The alternative of developing smaller HCPs for individual residential and commercial development projects would likely result in habitat fragmentation and isolation of populations. This larger umbrella HCP would also provide the County and the City of Lincoln a streamlined process for economic development. This effort, already underway, involves multiple partners, including city, county, State, and Federal agencies, home builders association, and conservation organizations."

Apparently, this plan will be prepared by Natural Heritage staff of the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission.

"Land Acquisition for Habitat Protection for the Salt Creek Tiger Beetle - (Lancaster County, NE) $275,000. Acquisition of this parcel within the Eastern Saline Wetlands complex will protect important habitat for the Salt Creek tiger beetle from the threat of development associated with the rapid expansion of both population and area of the city of Lincoln. The Salt Creek tiger beetle is highly imperiled, and the Service has identified protection of this property to allow natural recolonization from an adjacent population, or reintroduction if necessary, as one of the highest priorities for this species.

Funds from this grant are partial funding.

Negotiations with the landowner are currently ongoing, according to the wetland program manager of the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission.

"Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today announced nearly $66 million in grants to enable 25 states to work with private landowners, conservation organizations and other partners to protect and conserve the habitat of threatened and endangered species," according to a press release.

Army March Through the Eastern Sandhills in 1856

In response to his commanding officer, First Lieutenant William D. Smith of the 2nd Dragoons - the leader of the squadron in command - wrote a letter the day after receiving the request for details of journey just completed. His response was posted November 22, 1856 from Fort Kearny, Nebraska Territory.

Smith had just officiated over an Army force that during the few weeks of October just gone by, had moved along a route traversed to determine if the given path was suitable for wagon-road travel between Fort Kearny on the big bend of the Platte River, Nebraska Territory, and Fort Randall, along the mighty Missouri River, where it was going to soon flow beyond the southern edge of Dakota.

October 2nd the expedition left the Missouri River fort. Among the military there a couple of other commanding officers, as well as three laundresses particularly noted, burdened wagons, necessary live stock and others not mentioned. The 105 government horses for the eight wagons, were "all in bad condition," according to the account conveyed by Smith's hand-written journal. Two guides along to identify the route through the country included a "half-breed" and a Ponca Indian, though neither of them, Smith noted, had "ever crossed anywhere near our proposed line of march." Nonetheless, they were dutifully recognized.

The essential distances traveled were measured with a "viameter," the only recording instrument along available to measure anything. Only the mileage figures made it into the narrative, as there was not even a thermometer to denote daily temperatures during the passage over the sands, and across sinuous rivers of fresh, flowing water.

Across Creeks and Rivers

Moving along a vague route, the military force crossed numerous creeks and rivers, each carefully noted. A map issued in association with the Warren Expedition routes, issued a couple of years after the last route traversed in 1857, provides a rendition of the approximate route. The journal has other clues of the places seen, experienced and noted in the report to government officials which has never been published but is conserved in the papers of G.K. Warren, housed at a library in New York state.

On this particular portion of U.S. Army explorations of unsettled lands the first waterway - noted on October 3rd - was Ponca Creek, readily identified than and now. Water and grass was good.

The L Eau qui Court - i.e., the Niobrara River in its lower reaches - was described as a "wide and bold stream with low sandy banks and quick sand bottom a rapid current two feet in depth and a well timbered valley. ... Had much difficulty in crossing wagons on account of quick sands." The day's camp was on the south side of the Running Water.

Boggy banks of Willow Creek were the next crossing, as it was a southerly tributary stream of the prominent Niobrara. This may have been the Eagle Creek, as identified by the place name historians of the modern era.

Onward to the south, the Elk Horn was next along the way. "A beautiful creek of clear water with low well timbered banks and a fine sandy bottom." They passed the flat place where a settlement would be established in a couple of decades, named after an Irish man named O'Neill. The wagon train route went eastward for a few short miles along the river named for the discard of a grazer of the grass, and camped.

"Road good and water good and plenty. Wood plenty - grass good."

With the morning's bustle, the force direction of travel then continued southward.

There were more creeks to get across. The first was the Graham Branch, a tributary among the flat meadow lands. "Water was good and plenty," but wood was scarce, Smith wrote on the 6th of the tenth month in 1856.

Was this Dry Creek, as it is currently identified, the locality. The map for the expedition differs somewhat from the modern map, but in the interest of simplicity, this would be the general vicinity, in the modern Holt County.

"October 7th ... Road very bad passing over a succession of high sandy ridges (perpendicular to its course) and corresponding sandy depressions."

Next along the way was the designated Beaver Creek, which matches well the current channel of the Cedar River.

A couple of day's later, the force crossed the "Little Platte," based on the narrative, a locale on the northern side of the North Loup River, and a tributary of this North Fork. Next was Storm Creek with its "deep, boggy ravine with precipitous banks" that were noted in the Lieutenant's words. On 10 October, it was a rain storm day, so they all remained at Storm Creek all day doing whatever.

During the next day's march, the "North Fork of Pawnee Loup" was crossed. The river was "a wide and handsome stream of clear water, with low banks quick sand bottom and about two feet in depth - water good - wood plenty - good grass." This is the North Loup River, probably in the vicinity of Ord, which was not to occur until many years later in the area's history.

There are few observational details, with the condition of the grass, water and wood noted, but little else. Beyond Buffalo Creek, on October 11th, buffalo were seen for the first time, during the march over a very rugged country.

Southward, were more creeks. Closely looking at available maps does not indicate the precise places mentioned due to sparse notes and profound differences in map detail.

Mean Creek, was noted on the 12th, and crossed the following day. Then a crossing at the "South Fork of Pawnee Loup." Alternative names of "Potato or Hand River" were given for this river, now identified as the South Loup River.

The next channel crossing was at Bog Creek, "with very high precipitous and miry banks a rapid current and a very boggy bottom." It took seven hours to build a suitable bridge.

Spuyter Devil creek was the next challenge. It was like the mire at Bog Creek. There were a few more notable words in the account: "Country extremely rough." And another bridge had to be built which took sweat and toil by many for hours unknown.

In the terse rendition of the voyage, the next landmark was "L'eau qui Bonne" - a very beautiful stream of clear water with such a distinctive French moniker - about sixty feet wide and two feet deep with sandy banks and hard sandy bottom." Here a bridge was constructed to permit an easier crossing for covered wagons loaded with life and its attachments, and the associated herd used to pull the people along to a military fort down on the flat waters.

In the account quickly written more than 150 years ago, two names were given for a waterway still prominent on modern maps. It was designated as "Black Water creek (Wood River)" at the time. The route just to its north was through a "very rough and sandy section of country." Everyone remained encamped the next day as military men built a timber bridge across the waters so everyone could move along safely.

After crossing "Winding Creek (Ash creek?)," the valley lands of the Platte River were next along the route. The entire bunch of the government march crossed to the south bank, and then went westward to Fort Kearny, arriving on October 21st.

The entire route was traveled in less than three weeks, specifically noted as being twenty days on the road, with seventeen days of traveling. Smith did not note in his journal any native residents along the way, and in fact, not even anything about the multitude of the Army force moving along the route. Descriptions of the camps or activities of the people during the march were not noted in Smith's narrative.

Smith did note that some of the creeks were named "by the officers of the squadron as neither of the guides has names for them." Some names provided were based on the place names known by the Ponca guide.

Smith was "fully satisfied that the route we came was about the best that could have been chosen without making detour to the East," the report said.

To summarize the region so many decades ago, these words written by Lieut. Smith will have to suffice:

"Our route at the time of year when we came was almost impassible and I am compelled to believe that it could not be travelled in spring or at any time when the ground is soft or when the waters are up. There are too many points to tempt the squatter along the route were it not for the difficulty of reaching them. The forks of the Loup and the Elk Horn are peculiarly attractive without being particularly difficult of access.

"The entire section of country traversed by my command is wonderfully rugged and uneven but much of it yields fine grass - It is my opinion that it would make one of the finest wool growing regions that could possibly be found.

"Game was quite abundant along the route, Elk, Antelope, Deer, & Buffalo."

There were no notations of migratory birds, despite it being a time of passage for various migratory fowl.

These too brief chronicles convey a simplistic view of a sand hills region at a distinctive time in the regions first history when parties of government-sponsored expeditions were traveling among the dunes. The particular notes by Lieut. Smith notes how the itty-bitty grains of sand and rugged landforms, together, wrought a journey overcome with difficulty, among great and subtle dunes of an unsettled territory in 1856.

Smith's brief jaunt was finished, but the military explorations amongst the sandhills continued. In 1857, the primary party traveled along the Loup Fork and into the desolate hills beyond the river, through the dunes and onward to the Niobrara River, before they went onward to Fort Laramie.