The Best of Northeastern Washington & BC's West Kootenays
The Best of Northeastern Washington & BC's West Kootenays
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Boundaries February 2007 Bird Lessons, by Jack Nisbet Illustration: Saw-wheat owl silhouette by Emily Nisbet
 A few seasons ago (The North Columbia Monthly, June 2004), a Boundaries column peered into the winter habits of sharp-tailed grouse at Fort Colvile, the original Hudson’s Bay Company trading post above Kettle Falls. A peripatetic veterinarian and naturalist named James Keast Lord, who worked for the British team of the International Boundary Commission from 1858-62, not only dined on sharp-taileds often, but also took time to note the birds’ habits: their manner of huddling in the stubble of the trading posts’ grain fields; the way their thickly feathered feet allowed them to run easily atop crusted snow; the remarkable fitness and stable body fat of grouse he shot at thirty degrees below zero. Lord paid attention to the behavior of other birds he saw flying around Kettle Falls too, and his remarks, published after his return to England in the Journal of the Royal Artillery, make for fascinating reading. He organized his notes into a list that included only the birds he collected – shot, skinned, and shipped back to London – during his years with the Commission. Once he had a specimen in hand, Lord felt free to offer his observations and opinions about how a particular species fit into the world of the upper Columbia. That in turn allows us to compare birds we watch today with the way they might have been behaving a century and a half ago. Take owls for instance. Lord collected three species, beginning with the great horned owl, still for us the largest and most noticeable member of the family. He saw them commonly on both sides of the Cascade Range and east to the Rockies, and recorded them as nesting in hollow trees. Great horneds remained at Fort Colvile all winter long, where Lord observed them hunting tame pigeons around the post buildings in temperatures as low as -15º Fahrenheit. All of these attributes hold today, right down to the big owl’s hunting of rock doves that hang around the highway bridge and railroad trestle below the old Kettle Falls. During an arctic freeze that kept the temperature down around -30º for an extended period, Lord shot several specimens of the saw-whet, “a beautiful little owl,” in disused outbuildings around Fort Colvile. Although we haven’t seen a cold snap that severe for some decades, we do still see “irruptions” of small owls like saw-whets, when winter conditions and searches for food concentrate them in unlikely places. Lord admitted that “what their range may be I don’t know, as I never saw them at any other time, or in any other place,” but anyone who has heard the melodic short whistles of breeding saw-whet pairs in late winter knows that they remain a fairly common member of our forest community. The third owl Lord collected is nowhere near as well-known: he shot one hawk owl in the Okanogan, a second at Fort Colvile, and a third in the upper Kootenai drainage. Bird enthusiasts today learn about hawk owls as denizens of the far North, and every few years one might appear for local people to marvel at, but the idea of shooting three in a few months is hard to fathom. Something about either hawk owls or the landscape of the Inland Northwest must have changed since J.K. Lord spent his winters here. Some of particular behaviors of birds that Lord recorded seem equally puzzling. A variety of Corvids, or members of the jay family, have played a part in bird lore throughout history all around the northern hemisphere because they are highly intelligent, make noises that sound like talking, and don’t mind interacting with humans. Clark’s nutcracker’s gave Lord a chance to see what this uniquely American member of the family was up to. He saw nutcrackers everywhere between the Rockies and the Cascades, from sea level up to 7000 feet. He cut open the stomachs of many that he shot, and never found anything except seeds. “They arrive in Colvile about April in large flocks,” Lord observed, “and just hop about from branch to branch making the woods ring again with their harsh discordant cry.” Has anyone seen a large flock of nutcrackers hopping around the Colvile city park recently? During his entire stint in our region, Lord never shot a crow, but Lord counted Stellars jays – the large blue jay with the black crest – as “abundant everywhere from Vancouver Island to the summit of the Rocky Mountains. A few remain in Colvile during the winter.” Apparently the proportion of crows to Stellars jays has reversed itself over the years. But how? We think of large corvids as bold birds today, but in Lord’s time they seem to have taken even more liberties. Ravens stayed at Fort Colvile right through the coldest weather, apparently relying on humans for their food. “They were very bold and fearless, coming down among the dogs, and pitching close to the men” when the fur traders were butchering cattle. Magpies behaved similarly, a few hanging near the corrals during frigid days. “They are dreadfully destructive to mules and horses, pitching on them if they have sore backs, and keep continually picking at the wound.” According to Lord, some of the smallest songbirds joined the mischievous ravens in their tolerance of human presence. Horned larks, one of our common open country birds, lived in the Fort Colvile farmlands and corrals during the winter too. While watching their graceful group flights, Lord recalled a scene that took place south of the fort, when he was herding a shipment of mules north from the Dalles. When his party arrived at a spring after a long stretch of dry ground, “It was curious to see these shore-larks actually coming in among the legs of the men and mules to drink; intense thirst appeared to dispel all sense of fear.” Today, we see flocks of beautiful white snow buntings every few winters, wheeling through the open country in flocks that are usually hard to approach. J.K. Lord saw them during both of his cold seasons here, and doesn’t make it sound like the buntings were shy. “This bird is entirely a winter resident at Colvile; they arrive in October and November, and remain until March, and then go north to breed. They utter a sweet twittering kind of song when flying, and perch freely on bushes, rails, and the top of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s trading post at Fort Colvile.” Perhaps the most striking part of Lord’s list is his account of migration patterns. He collected only four different hawks while he was here, all of them familiar to local bird enthusiasts: the sparrow hawk, or kestrel; marsh hawk, or harrier; goshawk; and osprey. In our 21st century world, the osprey is the only one of these four that migrates into the area on a reasonably predictable spring schedule, goes through their breeding rituals and rearing of young, then departs for warmer climates. Depending on the winter, the other three can usually be seen around Colvile or not far to the south, hunting with their usual distinct methods. They might disappear for a while during a cold snap, but during our recent mild winters reappear long before the April dates given by Lord for their return. Of the factors that might alter ancient patterns of bird migration, things like damming a river, alterations in land use, habitat loss, and climate change come quickly to mind. The notes of J.K. Lord don’t point a finger at any one of these, and in fact make it clear that the only constant between his time and ours is the dynamic ability of birds – and presumably a lot of other constituents of our flora and fauna – to adapt on the fly to whatever is going on. It is change that is constant; it is the life that has developed in any one place that is sure to adjust, however subtly, over time. The North Columbia Monthly provides news, views, humor and a calendar of events
for an area that stretches from Nelson in British Columbia south
to Spokane in Washington State and covers all points in between.
A free (and free-thinking, progressive) magazine, The Monthly
is available at several hundred spots throughout the region and
now is also available on-line at www.ncmonthly.com. Published once a month since 1994, The
Monthly is an independent magazine that often challenges
contemporary wisdom by encouraging critical thinking about issues
and attitudes in the region and beyond. ©2008. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the contents or use in whole or part without written permission from the publishers is strictly prohibited. Views and opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of the publishers. |
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