Flying Lessons
  • Home
    • Our story
    • Birding and the Airstream
  • Photo Galleries
    • Photo Gallery Index
      • Belted Kingfishers Gallery
      • Counting Raptors
      • Birds of Glenwood Gardens
      • The Barred Owl Nextdoor
      • Magnificent Frigatebird
      • Woodpecker’s Nest
      • Red-shouldered Hawk Gallery
      • Blue-gray Gnatcatchers
      • In search of Warblers
      • Purple Gallinule
      • Sandhill Cranes — and their chicks
      • White Ibis Gallery
      • Catching Birds in Flight
      • Roseate Spoonbills in all their glory
      • A Rookery for Storks
      • Shore Birds
      • Dining Out
      • Love is in the Air: Two Barn Swallows’ take on the Birds and the Bees
  • Videos
  • Closeups
    • Birds in Flight
  • Beverly’s Basics
  • All Posts
    • All Posts
    • Facebook Posts
    • Flying Lessons on Instagram
    • Bird of the Week
    • Sharing birding tips
  • Get email updates
Gucci discovers birding, and it’s never been more...
This small wooden box may hold the future...
Looking for resolutions? Here are 10 ways to...
What a show: Battle of the Hummingbirds reaches...
A Pileated Woodpecker in holiday mode
Which is the best birdsong ID app? We...
A Prothonotary Warbler comes calling on a visit...
A Summer Tanager shows off its yuletide plumage
How on earth? Great White Pelican shows up...
The free Merlin app puts the magic into...
Flying Lessons
  • Home
    • Our story
    • Birding and the Airstream
  • Photo Galleries
    • Photo Gallery Index
      • Belted Kingfishers Gallery
      • Counting Raptors
      • Birds of Glenwood Gardens
      • The Barred Owl Nextdoor
      • Magnificent Frigatebird
      • Woodpecker’s Nest
      • Red-shouldered Hawk Gallery
      • Blue-gray Gnatcatchers
      • In search of Warblers
      • Purple Gallinule
      • Sandhill Cranes — and their chicks
      • White Ibis Gallery
      • Catching Birds in Flight
      • Roseate Spoonbills in all their glory
      • A Rookery for Storks
      • Shore Birds
      • Dining Out
      • Love is in the Air: Two Barn Swallows’ take on the Birds and the Bees
  • Videos
  • Closeups
    • Birds in Flight
  • Beverly’s Basics
  • All Posts
    • All Posts
    • Facebook Posts
    • Flying Lessons on Instagram
    • Bird of the Week
    • Sharing birding tips
  • Get email updates
Category:

Photography

BirdingFeaturedPhotography

What a show: Battle of the Hummingbirds reaches its peak

by Anders Gyllenhaal August 20, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

Only when we slowed the video way down and then blew it up could we see the ferocity of the encounter: The male Ruby-throated Hummingbird hovered above its competitor, then slammed bill-first into the female like a tiny gladiator.

The clash sent the two tumbling into the air. (See the video below.) Once again, the alpha male had done his job in the survival-of-the-fittest world of this smallest, most acrobatic of species.

A female Ruby-throated Hummingbird comes in for a landing on a favorite feeder. Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal

Much of the daily routines of nature are invisible to us. They take place deep in the woods, fields or wetlands, often at speeds that obscure any real details. Even the most avid birders get mere glimpses of how birds interact.

But the spread of hummingbird feeders all across the U.S. each summer doesn’t just help support these birds. In exchange for a supply of hummingbird sugar water, we get a close-up look at the way birds establish territories, settle into pecking orders, help and compete with one another and fight to survive.

      Here’s a video about the fierce competition playing out around the feeders:

Continue Reading
August 20, 2020 0 comment
3 FacebookTwitterEmail
PhotographyPhotoPost

The Ovenbird takes to the stage

by Anders Gyllenhaal August 5, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

    You can usually hear the Ovenbird from a long way off. Its piercing, crystal clear voice cuts through the woods as if singing through a sound system at a Broadway theater.

     This is a bird that deserves a stage.

     PhotoPost, a new feature on Flying Lessons built around visuals, starts with a video that puts you in a front-row seat for an Ovenbird’s performance:

     We aren’t the first to be captivated by the Ovenbird, a stately warbler with oversized eyes and striped plumage that looks like he’s dressed up for the occasion. (Actually it helps the birds blend in with the ground where they spends much of their time.). The species is named for the nest it builds that looks like a tiny bread-baking oven.

     The Ovenbird has long been recognized for its song. More than a century ago, poet Robert Frost wrote a sonnet to its haunting tune that, to the poet’s ears, mourned the passing of the season in mid August.

     When it sings, the Ovenbird throws its whole body into the act, raising its head to the canopy and turning this way and then that.

     Here’s another take on the Ovenbird that puts its song in the orchestra of the dawn chorus. Lang Elliott has spent 30 years recording the sounds of nature, collected on this intriguing website. A few years ago, he captured the Ovenbird leading the birds at dawn in this recording.

    The Ovenbird is so loud and consistent that researchers have turned to its songs when needing to study bird audio. The most famous findings dates back to 1958.  

     Researchers concocted a complicated test that let them compare the Ovenbird’s reaction to birds it had heard before against those it hadn’t. The study came to the important conclusion that Ovenbirds, and presumably other species, can tell the differences in tones of the songs of other birds. That study had stood for decades as a premiere finding on the listening skills of birds.

     Most birds don’t give you much of a show before fleeing when people approach. But every time we’ve come across an Ovenbird they’ve delivered a whole symphony of birdsongs. Most of these photos are from an encounter in the North Carolina mountains this summer. We were walking through the Dupont State Forest on the North and South Carolina line when we heard the Ovenbird’s unmistakeable voice that seems to sing “teacher, teacher, teacher.”

     At first, we couldn’t locate the bird, but he wasn’t going anywhere so we had time to look for him. We finally zeroed in on a low branch, not far from our path — and there he was as the video above captured, pure poetry.

     Robert Front’s poem is about the bird — and also the observer and the passage of time. We’ll let him have the last word:

——————————————–

The Oven Bird

There is a singer everyone has heard,

Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,

Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.

He says that leaves are old and that for flowers

Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.

He says the early petal-fall is past

When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers

On sunny days a moment overcast;

And comes that other fall we name the fall.

He says the highway dust is over all.

The bird would cease and be as other birds

But that he knows in singing not to sing.

The question that he frames in all but words

Is what to make of a diminished thing.

———————-

And here’s a final gallery of Ovenbird photos:

August 5, 2020 0 comment
0 FacebookTwitterEmail
Bird of the WeekBirds storiesMigrationPhotography

A holy rite of spring: A Prothonotary Warbler’s visit like no other

by Beverly Mills Gyllenhaal May 14, 2020
written by Beverly Mills Gyllenhaal

All warblers are wonderful to watch, particularly males in the spring. Nature gives them fresh feathers, all the better to snare a mate. For some warblers, spring markings and colors intensify to the point that they look nothing like their normal selves.

My favorite is the Prothonotary Warbler.

Of the 37 species in the Eastern U.S., the male Prothonotary is the only one that glows. His head is a saturated yellow-orange, earning him the nickname “Golden Swamp Warbler.”

Finding a Prothonotary feels like finding that last, hopelessly hidden Easter egg. You have to see it to fully appreciate it, and every time, he takes my breath away.

Yesterday we got lucky. A male in its full spring splendor shot out from under the bridge where Anders and I were standing and headed straight for a bush not 10 feet away and directly in front of us. In the past four years, we’ve seen this bird four times in four states without the lengthy encounter that this little bird gave us.

The visit was a photographer’s delight – perfect late afternoon light and a bird so hungry he foraged out in the open for a good 15 minutes.

Continue Reading
May 14, 2020 1 comment
3 FacebookTwitterEmail
Birding researchConservationPhotography

The transformation in bird research may hold the key

by Anders Gyllenhaal May 5, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

One of the topics we explore here on Flying Lessons is the transformation taking place with modern bird research. When we start talking about this with friends and relatives, it can be hard to hold their attention.

But here’s why this is worth sticking with: At a time when habitat loss, climate change and urban hazards have destroyed a third of the bird population in our time, the best remedy may be the powerful technologies that scientists are using to create more powerful conservation practices. 

Archbold researcher Reed Bowman. Photo by Anders Gyllenhaal

One such story is running this week in The Miami Herald, about a radio telemetry system at the Archbold Biological Station in Central Florida where we visited a few months ago. The research project equips young Florida Scrub-jays with solar-powered tags that enable scientists to track their every waking move.

Scrub-jays, the only bird found exclusively in Florida, have steadily lost population to development as the state has grown into the country’s fourth most populated. Researchers think they can halt the jays’ decline if they understand how to make the most of the remaining scrub habitat, including a string of public lands through the state’s mid-section.

These studies are expensive and time-consuming, and they require a level of public and political support that doesn’t come easily. That’s why we think it’s worth coming back to these research projects and trying to tell the stories in detail. We hope you’ll take a moment to read this piece in the Herald, as well as earlier Flying Lessons posts on the Scrub-Jay, one about the striking character of this bird and another about the early findings on this study. 

The base-station antenna that supports the research is installed by Michael Lanzone, head of Cellular Tracking Technologies, and lead researcher Young Ha Suh. Photo by Reed Bowman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

May 5, 2020 0 comment
0 FacebookTwitterEmail
Bird of the WeekHow we're birding nowPhotography

Quarantined with an Owl Nextdoor: But will we ever find him?

by Anders Gyllenhaal April 23, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

Part of a series

When we finally spotted our neighborhood’s Barred Owl, perched deep in the nearby woods but still within hooting distance of our balcony, we realized he was one step ahead of us.

Our owl watching from one of his favorite spots / Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal

The owl had been watching us long before we found him.

We spotted him planted on a branch midway up a towering ivy-covered tree, camouflaged with a background that perfectly matched his plumage. He was staring down at us as if to say, what took so long.

The Barred Owl is a surveillance wonder. Its huge, dark eyes have telescopic vision. It can sit for hours scouring its territory. It can swivel its heads almost all the way around in either direction, a feat so impressive researchers at Johns Hopkins University conducted a full-fledged study to figure out how owls do what no other creature can. (See the explanation below after the second photo gallery.)

 

Almost as soon as we moved into our new home not far from downtown Raleigh, N.C., we started hearing our owl’s “Who Cooks for You” hoot. (Click for samples.) Barred Owls are homebodies, staying mostly put and rarely traveling far throughout their lifetime. Despite the urban setting, ours found a slice of woodlands with just the mix of aged trees, thick underbrush and a running stream owls prefer.

Flying Lessons: The Barred Owl has abilities no other creature does. Between its telescopic eyes and its swiveling head, the owl’s attributes have long been under study. A nocturnal bird that blends into its surroundings, the owl likes to stay out of sight. But when you do get a look, he’s a sight to behold.   
Continue Reading
April 23, 2020 4 comments
0 FacebookTwitterEmail
Bird of the WeekBirds storiesMigrationPhotography

Cedar Waxwings are dining their way north: Don’t miss the show

by Anders Gyllenhaal April 17, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

 

 

Here’s a delicious fact about Cedar Waxwings: They can strip a tree of its berries in such a rush the juice turns to wine and they get too buzzed to fly.

Robert Rice, a veteran bird scientist who spent his career with the Smithsonian’s Migratory Bird Center, explained what happens: “They can eat so much fruit, it ferments in their gut and they go wobbly for a while,” Rice said.

Few other birds feast in such a mass frenzy, and the phenomenon is on display this time of year as bands of waxwings dine their way north from the lower U.S. and Central America and as far up as Canada.

It’s a magnificent sight, one I assumed I’d miss this year with our limited mobility. But the other day, wandering through the trees not 50 feet from our home, I noticed what looked like a new arrival. It was the first of a flock of Cedar Waxwings that gradually became an avalanche, all collecting insects as if their lives depended on it.

They began high in the trees, then gradually worked their way down to the lower branches. Today insects were on the menu, and one bird after another took a turn working the branches, all the while ignoring our presence as only the migration enables. It’s a gift to birders, and photographers, enabling closeup views you rarely are granted.

Flying Lesson: The Cedar Waxwing is a study in nature’s design, with touches of yellow, red and brown slashed across a form that is almost always in motion. A good bit of that motion is spent on its frantic feeding. They go overboard on that front as well.

Continue Reading
April 17, 2020 4 comments
1 FacebookTwitterEmail
BirdingBirds storiesMigrationPhotography

In a world turned upside-down, birds can help restore some sanity

by Beverly Mills Gyllenhaal April 2, 2020
written by Beverly Mills Gyllenhaal

Second of two parts

There’s not a lot to be optimistic about during the virus meltdown, but here’s something bird enthusiasts can celebrate: The news is full of suggestions that people take up birdwatching to battle stay-at-home boredom and anxiety.

As birders all know, the more people get interested in birds, the more likely they are to want our state and federal government agencies to protect them.

A Carolina Chickadee among the buds outside our window / Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal

I’m still giddy over the Slate magazine article a few days ago with the headline: “You Have No Choice But to Become a Backyard Birder.”

Slate’s article is a terrific, step-by-step guide on how to morph from a person who sort of likes birds into one who could possibly become a serious birder one day. Click here for the story.

This isn’t the only “Bird Now” headline landing in my Google feed. I’ve seen similar stories from local radio and television stations, newspapers and news websites.

“Riotous Explosion of Life Awaits Birding Newbies in This Stay-at-home Era” proclaims the March 28 headline from NPR station WHYY in Philadelphia.

 “[Birding] is a time-tested way of putting things back in perspective and realizing that life does go on and will go on,” said Jeffrey Gordon, president of the American Birding Association, in the WHYY interview. “It feels like a perfect fit.” Here’s that story. 

Continue Reading
April 2, 2020 0 comment
1 FacebookTwitterEmail
Bird of the WeekPhotography

How the Northern Cardinal is helping me through the virus crisis

by Anders Gyllenhaal March 26, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

First of two parts

If there’s a singular song of spring, it’s the call of the Northern Cardinal.

That loud, distinctive whistle is often the earliest note of the morning in much of the country. When the full bird orchestra eventually joins in, the Cardinal still holds the first chair.

Ever since the virus chased us all into our homes, I’ve added a morning birding walk under the guise of exercise (a loophole where we live.) It’s an antidote to the uncertainty; the first arrivals of migration are showing up right on cue in eastern North Carolina, while the year-round birds are hard at work gathering food, building nests and pairing up.

The female cardinal with its mute plumage and bright beak.

Almost everywhere I walk, Northern Cardinals are there to serenade. Their repertoire is rich and familiar, including that flute-like “cheer-cheer” opening, their steady chirps, their staccato zip-zips that sound like something from a video game. It’s not too strong to call it incessant on some days.

Continue Reading
March 26, 2020 3 comments
1 FacebookTwitterEmail
BirdingBirding researchConservationPhotography

An unexpected discovery: These birds are a lot more like us than we knew

by Anders Gyllenhaal March 17, 2020
written by Anders Gyllenhaal

When researchers built a giant grid of radio receivers for tracking birds in the sandy fields south of Orlando, they hoped to find new ways of protecting the struggling Florida Scrub-Jay.

Florida Scrub-Jay / Photos by Anders Gyllenhaal

They discovered something else along the way. Birds are a lot more like people than either species might have thought.

The grid concept is something new in bird research. By setting up receivers throughout the Scrub-Jay’s territory, and then equipping the birds with solar-powered tracking devices, biologists can follow the birds’ every move all day long for months at a time.

The research is still in its early stages, but some intriguing behaviors have jumped out:

Like teenagers everywhere, the young jays form tight cliques of favorite friends. Like many parents, adult jays try to build enough territory to pass sections along to their offspring. When the birds start looking for mates, they come up with ways of sizing up the competition – and sometimes coming between couples. 

Archbold biologist Reed Bowman looks over a map of the Scrub-Jays’ territory

“It turns out that they have very complicated social lives that aren’t that different from ourselves,’’ said Reed Bowman, a research biologist at the Archbold Biological Center that has been studying the Florida jays for decades.

The Florida Scrub-Jay is one of the state’s most popular birds and an uncommon segment of the jay species. They’re found only in Florida. – and now only in a few central Florida counties. They’re unusually friendly toward humans. Proponents have pushed, so far without success, to make the Scrub-Jay the state bird in place of the more ordinary Mockingbird.

Researcher Young Ha Suh / Photo by Reed Bowman

But they’ve been in a long, steady decline, mostly because the jays are so dependent on dry, elevated and mostly treeless habitat that has steadily been lost to development. Wildlife managers are trying to learn how to protect the last 4,000 Florida Scrub-Jays.

The Archbold researchers believe the key is understanding how the birds use what’s left of their habitat. They want to know how the young birds approach breeding and what wildlife managers can do to create the best environment for the jays.

At first, researchers thought they could conduct this research by simply watching the jays in the field. “But you could only track a handful of birds at a time,’’ said Young Ha Suh, a doctoral candidate at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the project’s lead researcher. “It was really time-consuming.’’

Continue Reading
March 17, 2020 0 comment
0 FacebookTwitterEmail
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • …
  • 6

Sign up for Flying Lessons

Welcome to Flying Lessons, a website devoted to what we’re learning from the birds. You can sign up here for our weekly newsletter, visit our Facebook page here, spend time in our pages devoted to photos, birding advice, videos and special projects. We hope you enjoy your visit — and make this a regular stop.

FLYING LESSONS VIDEOS

White-eyed Vireo Gray Catbird Red-shouldered Hawk Northern Flicker Cedar Waxwing Barred Owl American Goldfinch Northern Waterthrush Summer Tanager Northern Cardinal Carolina Chickadee

In-depth stories

Grasshopper Sparrow

Here are links to some of the deeper stories we’ve written for publications from the Washington Post to The Miami Herald exploring the frontiers of birding and avian research. This story for the Post was about the role of every-day birders in creating the largest citizen science project in the world. This piece for The Herald looked at the surprising strength of the Roseate Spoonbill in the midst of climate change. And this article and video for The News & Observer and Charlotte Observer is about how some adventurous hummingbirds are abandoning their migration and staying the winter in the U.S. Our latest story in the Washington Post is about a rescue mission for the imperiled Florida Grasshopper Sparrow. 

Miami Herald’s Spoonbill package

Some favorite birds

Barred Owl Orlando, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Ruby-throated Hummingbird West Stockbridge, Massachusetts
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Hairy Woodpecker Prime Hook Refuge, Delaware
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Prairie Warbler Cape May, New Jersey
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Red-bellied Woodpecker St. Joe Overstreet Landing, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Eastern Wood-Peewee Rock Creek Park, Washington, DC
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Eastern Meadowlark Kissimmee, Florida
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Black-throated Blue Warbler Raleigh, North Carolina
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal
Northern Flicker Alexandria, Virginia
Copyright by Anders and Beverly Gyllehhaal

Birds in Flight

Roseate Spoonbill BIRDS IN FLIGHT FELLSMERE, FLORIDA OSPREY BIRDS IN FLIGHT Orlando, Florida American Flamingo BIRDS IN FLIGHT Rio Largartos, Mexico COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL EASTERN MEADOWLARK BIRDS IN FLIGHT KISSIMMEE, FLORIDA Red-shouldered Hawk BIRDS IN FLIGHT Orlando, Florida COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL PALM WARBLER BIRDS IN FLIGHT ORLANDO, FLORIDA BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER BIRDS IN FLIGHT LORTON, VIRGINIA BROWN PELICAN BIRDS IN FLIGHT ASSATEAGUE, MARYLAND COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL WOOD STORK BIRDS IN FLIGHT MELBOURNE, FLORIDA COPYRIGHT BY ANDERS AND BEVERLY GYLLENHAAL

Our Facebook page

Our Facebook page

Can a bird sing with a banjo?

Sign up for our weekly newsletter


Quotes for the birds

“When someone asks me why birds are so important to me, all I can do is sigh and shake my head, as if I’ve been asked to explain why I love my brothers.”

— Jonathan Franzen, novelist and renown birder from his National Geographic Magazine essay on the “Year of the Bird.”

Comments, Suggestions & Quips:

On How Birds Teach Humility:

–“NOB. Love it! Great little truths in this post.” – Chara Daum

— “Appreciate your insights, Beverly.” -Ruth Harrell

— “Loving your Flying Lessons blog.” -Susan May, San Francisco

On our offbeat video of a Tufted Titmouse singing along with a banjo:

“That is totally cool,” Tony Mas, Dahlonega, Ga.

“This brought a smile to us. Thanks.” John Deen, St. Paul, MN.

“Really amazing.” Florence Strickland, Sunset Beach, N.C.

On the Mandarin duck’s arrival in Central Park:

— “I think he gets his own Saturday morning now.” -Stephen Colby, Raleigh, N.C.

— “What a beautiful bird. Its colors look painted on. Magnificent.” -Christine DiMattei

On the falling numbers of Wild Turkeys:

“I was just mentioning this to a friend, how I used to see Wild Turkeys every time I hit a dirt road, and now it’s almost rare.” -Jeff Brooks.

“There are a hundred times more turkeys than when I was a kid. Fake BS to shake down donations and public funding.” -Vance Shearer

 

Categories

  • Beverly's Birding Basics (9)
  • Bird of the Week (32)
  • Birding (83)
  • Birding and the Airstream (3)
  • Birding research (39)
  • Birding technology (2)
  • Birds stories (25)
  • Birdsongs (2)
  • Breeding and Nesting (9)
  • Conservation (22)
  • Featured (29)
  • Fledging (2)
  • Flight (6)
  • Flying Lessons essay (3)
  • How we're birding now (8)
  • Migration (30)
  • Photography (52)
  • PhotoPost (3)
  • Postcard (4)
  • Research (1)
  • Species (9)
  • Uncategorized (1)
  • Video (3)

How to reach us

Flying Lessons
Raleigh, NC.
FlyingLessons1@gmail.com

About us

About us

We’re two journalists who’ve traded in our work in publishing and syndicated writing for following and photographing the birds. We live in Raleigh, NC, but are traveling the country every chance we get -- and are sharing the lessons birds are teaching us and the photos we take along the way.

Popular Posts

  • 1

    How on earth? Great White Pelican shows up on the other side of the world

    February 6, 2020
  • 2

    How on earth? Great White Pelican shows up on the other side of the world

    December 13, 2020
  • 3

    What a show: Battle of the Hummingbirds reaches its peak

    December 30, 2020
  • 4

    What a show: Battle of the Hummingbirds reaches its peak

    August 20, 2020
  • 5

    Cedar Waxwings are dining their way north: Don’t miss the show

    April 17, 2020
  • 6

    We used to snicker at Snowbirds — until we discovered this Airstream getaway

    April 9, 2019

Why Flying Lessons

This website is about what we can learn from the birds around us. Some of the lessons are obvious, such as the way birds can be a barometer of environmental changes. Others are subtle, like the way you, as an observer, have to adapt to navigate the world in which birds operate. We ourselves still have much to learn about birding, a late-in-life pursuit that has captivated us in retirement. But we decided to start writing about the lessons and teachings as we’re finding our way, in hopes that our storytelling and photography will help to celebrate a captivating element of nature.

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram

@2017 - PenciDesign. All Right Reserved. Designed and Developed by PenciDesign