Disappearing Birds

When birds disappear from my neighborhood in part because of all the new housing developments, life loses some of its color.

This piece has been long in the imagining as well as the engineering. I still have a ways to go. The grey carved feather is from a true tail feather of a peacock. These tail feathers are meant to support all the colorful display feathers that grow on the back of the male peacock which we often mistakenly call “the tail”.

The boxes will have bottles with colorful feathers inside, perhaps as memories of what once was.

Where Are the Big Colorful Feathers?

Marsh Cattail Wren . 7 x 5 inches . amazon parrot secondary wing feathers

Except for feathers from a couple of parrots like macaws tails, birds do not have large colorful feathers. Most colorful feathers are small. When color is on wing feathers, I have noticed that the bright colors are placed where they can be hidden, like on the secondary wing feathers.

The three to five-inch small feathers with a bit of color require compositions of many feathers for my commonly sized pieces of 12 inches or bigger. However, when I have a design idea that use just one or two of these small feathers, the finished piece will have to be smaller.

These amazon parrot secondary flight feathers sport the bright red in this picture that reminded me of the shape of cattails. Cattails are not red of course but if they were, they would pose a fine juxtaposition to the marsh wrens whose colors are so brownly-muted cattail-colored that they are quite difficult to spot. Usually, all I see is a hint of movement, maybe the rustle of a cattail stalk.

Feather the Nest

If birds survived when the rest of the dinosaurs did not, it may be partially because birds kept warm with feathers and when they lined the nest with feathers, the feathers would keep the eggs warmer. In addition, feathered nests protect baby birds from microbial infections and parasites.

One research write-up is here: https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.6931. The study also tells a story of blue tit males placing colored feathers on the outside rim of their nests. Who knows why!

Get That Bug!

Get That Bug! turkey feathers, 16 x 16 inches

I made and named this carving, Get That Bug, not consciously thinking at the time that this is one way we are trying to cope with the coronavirus.

The thing is, flycatchers are really good at catching bugs. Are we?

Getting Peculiar

I love making my art and am used to alone time in the studio. But during the pandemic isolation, I miss socializing. It is starting to make me a little peculiar (more than I already was). When I went to the market, I found myself just standing still staring at each person. Also, I notice I am getting a little rusty in the communication when on Zoom calls with a lot of people.

Unusual Feather Coloring Here

Gull Flight detail

These gull silhouettes are carved from the shed tail feathers of a great blue turaco. These birds live in sub-Saharan Africa where their bodies have learned to use copper in the food they eat to make green, red, and blue-colored feathers. Other birds also grow green, red, and blue feathers but not by using copper. For their red feathers, they metabolize a class of chemicals called carotenoids in the food they eat. The blues in all birds’ feathers except the turaco comes from the light absorbing and reflective microscopic form of the structure of their feathers.

What Bird Is This Lovely Feather From?

This is from a northern flicker. Notice the orange-red shaft. Red-shafted northern flickers live in the western part of North America and yellow-shafted ones live in the eastern part. No other bird I know of displays yellow or orange color in its feathers’ shafts. Most bird’s feather shafts are whitish, some are black.

Taking a quick look at the research*, I learned that the color in these shafts (and other parts of the feathers) is made through metabolizing what the birds eat: food with carotenoids. This is the same food ingredient that many kinds of birds use to make colored feathers, reds, oranges, and yellows. The yellow shafted northern flickers metabolize their food in a slightly different way to make the yellow color than the red shafted flickers metabolize for the orange color.

I found speculation but little solid information that explains how birds use the yellow and orange-shafts; how it helps them live their lives.

People sometimes send me images of feathers they have found and want to know what bird it is from. This one was easy.

*Karen L. Wiebe and Gary R Bortolotti, Variation in Carotin-based color in Northern Flickers in a Hybrid Zone. Wilson Bull., 114(3), 2002, pp. 393–400

Kingfisher and the Mussel

This article was taken from the Northern Woodlands magazine. Researching kingfisher behavior as I was working on a piece about kingfishers and fish, I came across some fascinating writing in the Northern Woodlands Magazine (I visited and presented at their annual conference a year ago). The topic is a kingfisher and a mussel. The Kingfisher got its beak stuck in a freshwater mussel, possibly thinking it was a fish. The author, Declan McCabe explains in his article included below in this posting.

My inspiration was what sometimes happens when people create ponds to keep koi and goldfish. They witness occasional predation by herons and kingfishers.

Goldfisher, using a naturally shed argus pheasant primary wing feather

Adelaide Tyrol drawn from a photograph by Rich Kelly

Declan McCabe, who teaches biology at Saint Michael’s College wrote the following:

Last July, Rich Kelley posted a most unusual photograph to the Vermont Birding Facebook group with the caption, “Someone bit off more than he could chew.” The photo, taken in the Missisquoi National Wildlife Refuge, showed a belted kingfisher weighted down by a mussel clamped firmly onto its beak. They were locked in an embrace that, absent intervention, would have been fatal for both; thankfully, Rich effected a rescue.

The photo inspired a rare eureka moment. I strung a few scientific facts together and jumped to a possibly outlandish conclusion: this had been deliberate action by the mussel, doing what mussels do, misinterpreted by a kingfisher, doing exactly what kingfishers do.

Before you write me off as a biologist out in the sun too long, bear with me while I present the facts. First, consider the kingfisher. The name says it all: they fish and fish well. Kingfishers are visual predators that drop from high perches to execute full body dives so their spear-shaped beaks cut through the water – but not through the fish! That’s right, contrary to popular belief, kingfishers don’t spear fish. Instead, they open wide and close their bills to firmly grip their slimy prey.

To really evaluate my speculation, I needed to find out if the belted kingfisher menu extends beyond fish to include, perhaps, eastern lamp mussels. I learned that the kingfisher’s diet may comprise insects, crayfish, and occasionally small mammals, amphibians, and reptiles. But the king’s share of their diet consists of fish. Nowhere in the papers I consulted were mussels of any type part of the kingfisher’s meal plan.

The first part of my quest was complete: it seemed unlikely that the kingfisher in question was out hunting mussels. My next step was to explore mussel biology to see if the timing of Kelley’s photo was right for my hypothesis.

Eastern lamp mussels don’t generally travel far. To disperse, they act like submerged hitchhikers. Larval lamp mussels, called “glochidia,” attach to fish gills for about a month and travel as far as the fish swims before dropping off in their long term home. How they attach to the fish is the link in the chain that may just have accidentally ensnared a Vermont kingfisher.

Lamp mussel glochidia don’t swim, and they remain in their mother’s pouch until a fish makes direct contact with mother mussel. Direct fish-mussel contact has not been left to chance. When the season is right, the mother lamp mussel grows an extraordinary structure that hungry fish just can’t resist.

Sprouting from its soft tissue, and protruding between the half shells, the mussel grows a near perfect “fish.” At the “head” end is often an eye spot, and at the opposite end, a tail complete with fish-like patterns and even a delicate set of fins. To complete the ruse, the mussel twitches its little lure, like any good angler, to catch the eye of a passing fish. Ideally, the lure attracts a yellow perch, which is the only known host for eastern lamp mussels. Real fish strike at the little fake “fish,” and the mother mussel ejects her glochidia, which promptly clamp onto the fish’s gills.

Another question essential to my theorized plot is when does all of this happen? Scientists on Lake Ontario found glochidia on yellow perch gills in both May and August. So it’s reasonable to expect appetizing mussel-fish lures in July in Lake Champlain.

If the mussel lures are convincing enough to entice fish to strike, it’s a small leap to imagine that they may fool a different visual fish predator: the kingfisher. A leap of faith and imaginative conjecture however, is not enough to provide scientific certainty. To truly support my hypothesis, I’ll need to schedule an interview with a certain kingfisher. And I’ll ask the question every teenager dreads: “What WERE you thinking?”

Declan McCabe new book, Turning Stones: Life in Freshwater (McDonald & Woodward Publishing) includes this and many other essays.

Prints

Peacock feather wallpaper design

I sometimes work with designers to make large prints of my original art and of photographs of feathers. This one is in a line of wallpaper through a contract with Brenda Houston who creates and sells beautiful wallpapers. Also, my photos of feathers have found their way through designers into hospitals and hotels. Mostly though, I create original art and don’t have a business of selling smaller prints of feathers nor prints of my original art. One exception is that I make some prints of my original work to gift to nonprofit organizations with a natural history conservation bent for fundraising activities.

Birds Paint Their Feathers

Chilean flamingo feather

Subconsciously, I imagine that humans are better than other creatures. For instance, I usually think that we are the only creatures who are creative. Here is a little tidbit that helps shake that up that assumption:

Some birds use secretions from their oil gland to paint enhancements onto their feather colors. For instance, I thought that the flamingos’ orange color came from their bodies processing the carotenoid-rich shrimp that they eat into growing feathers as pink and orange. It does, but in addition, an even brighter orange color oozes out of the bird’s oil gland on its back. The bird carefully and selectively spreads this on their feathers to further color itself.

Other birds find ways in their environment to brighten their feathers. In zoos, the bearded vulture’s feathers are white. In the wild, they rub their bellies into red soil, then choose where to further spread the red color on their other feathers.

Over a dozen bird families color own feathers in some way. In addition, bright pigmented reds, oranges and yellows in birds are derived from the food that they eat. We might assume that creatures are dumb and do everything by instinct. However, birds consciously choose the best foods for themselves consciously evaluating a number of factors, one of which might be, “How is this going to color my feathers?”

The more I learn about birds and other living beings, the less I imagine my human abilities as setting me apart and above birds and the rest of life.

1. Amat, Juan A, & Rendon, M.A. 2017. Flamingos. Behavior, Biology, and Relationship with Humans

2. Negro J.J., Margalida A., Hiraldo F., & Herdia R. 1999. The Function of the Cosmetic Coloration of Bearded Vultures: When Art Imitates Life.

3. Delhey K, 2007. Cosmetic Coloration in Birds: Occurrence, Function, and Evolution. American Naturalist

Getting Outside a Box

Andrea’s Bird, adapted from a sumi-e sketch of my mother’s (she was an artist)

“It’s tempting to hide in small rooms built from quick answers”. Merlin Sheldrake, in his book, Entangled Life. His research into fungus points toward life as much more complicated than we think; like our bodies being composed of more fungus and microorganism cells than animal cells. So, he asks, “who are we?” Are we really the individuals we think we are? Or are we less well defined, whole environments working together to make what we imagine to be our our free will?

When I consider this, I let go of my quick answers and habits of viewing the world. Then sounds become sharper and the grass appears greener.

This kind of thinking attracts me because I want my art to pleasantly surprise people after they view it, to see the world a little differently, with more sparkle.

What Is In a Name?

Flicker On and Off, turkey tail feathers

A number of flickers (a kind of woodpecker) busy themselves outside my studio. The two designs I made are inspired both by the birds and by the “flickering” of light. This one is entitled Flicker On and Off. What do flickers do to deserve the name flicker anyway?

Feather Posters

Parrot feathers, can you name them all?

We can now choose from 300 individual parrot feather photographs on grey backgrounds to compose into larger posters. Each of these feathers is a separate high resolution image. The sizes are relative to each other. My main interest is still carving feathers and placing them in shadowboxes. That said, I am fascinated by all feathers so photographing them is a good way to closely look at each one.

The posters will have a separate guides identifying each feather.

Feather Photographs

Sunbittern wing feather from Woodland Park Zoo

This is an example from a new series of stock feather images on grey backgrounds. I have been working on this project for the past month and am up to 600 high resolutions photos. My goal is to compose these individual pictures into larger posters with many feathers. With feathers, solid, uniform black backgrounds are relatively easy to photograph and to perform post-production. A uniform grey background is more difficult to create. Consistent, even lighting is a key. Because the fine downy feathers pick up any background color, the background color cannot be changed without the previous color showing through. So, each camera image has to have the same uniform background color so they blend uniformly with a single grey when joined together with the other feather photographs.

Reflection

Swan Reflection, mute swan flight feathers

During a time of physical isolation such as when we need to avoid contact so disease does not spread, is a time for reflection for me and many people I know. So I continue to create a series of pieces called Reflection.

In this piece, you likely only see a bird and its rippled reflection but for me it means more. It carries a story of what I have been thinking about, self discoveries I have made, and a feeling of connection with the rest of humanity who has been facing the same threat of a spreading dis-ease.

Paint the Floor

Like a bird needs to keep its feathers clean and neat, I found that my cluttered studio was getting in the way of my creative process. I am slowly renovating, organizing, and cleaning it. This is an ongoing project that includes building a climate controlled storage space in my barn. More immediately, I put castors on the flat files, desks, and cutting table and moved a lot of packing stuff and frames into my barn for the summer as well as painted the floor. It was just unpainted cement with a lot of stains and marks from previous projects. As a creative sort of person, I thought of all sorts of ideas for the floor, like painting large feather designs using many colors. I opted for two colors with this simple design down the middle. What do you think?

Piercing the Veil

Piercing the Veil #3, 18 x 12 inches, greenwing macaw tail feathers

Indigenous people who lived next to the salt waters of the far northwest USA and through British Columbia and Alaska boated on the surface of the waters to get from here to there and received their sustenance from the waters below. I read an old anthropology article. This world above the waters was described as something of an illusion, the surface was considered a veil covering a more real world below.

As Above So Below

As Above, So Below, two carved turkey wing feathers, 18 x 18 inches. Final piece. See the previous blog entry for a video of the carving process.

In Yellowstone National Park a few years ago, the wolf found the elk. The virus has found us and like the elk we are forced to be more cautious.

When death comes to the forefront of my attention, life can take on added sparkle if I let go of trying to hang on. Death then, seems somehow right, a part of a whole.

A bird has to kill to eat to nourish the growth of its feathers. I make art with their gently shed feathers which retain their beauty and complexity. 
Yet the birds are still alive.
This is a comfort to me.

Creating As Above So Below

A stop-motion video of the top feather of As Above So Below. The next post in two weeks will show the final 18 x 18 inch piece.

Bird Food

Kingfisher and Sandlance, turaco tail feathers, 15 x 12 inches

These four-inch skinny salt-water fish swim in abundance in Puget Sound. Bigger fish and kingfishers, gulls, puffins, cormorants, diving ducks, and grebes dine on them. To escape, they bury themselves under the sands. Sometimes, while walking during a low tide, I notice these little fish squirting from the sand in response to my heavy footsteps. Unlike the herring of the region, not a lot is known about them even though, like herring, they are a vital food for salmon and other creatures.