NATURE'S BLUES

It is April.
Again!

In British Columbia April means Spring. 
And Spring means that the birds are back! 
They come in drones from their vacation homes "down south". 
Or is it that their vacation homes are here, "up north"?
Call it what you want, they are back and the world seems to be a much happier place.

The first half of April "up here" means, that unlike "down south", most places are still only modestly green or even beige and brown. 
Some are even white! 
But then a dash of the most attractive blue cuts through the landscape!

Bluebirds have arrived!

There are 3 kinds of bluebirds in Canada and 2 of them, the Mountain and the Western live in British Columbia. The third one, the Eastern bluebird, has not conquered the Rockies yet, it can be found in the Eastern part of North America. 

The one above is  Mountain bluebird (Sialia currucoides).

And, below is a pair - Mom and Dad. 
Actually, there was only one mullein plant there and they took turns perching on it for a better view while hunting for insects. Thanks to Adobe Photoshop the 2 images got stitched into a seamless composition (although color-wise they were a bit different to start with). Just overlap the two, go to Edit, Auto-blend images and choose Panorama. Photoshop adjusted the overall tones as well.

 Here they are again, this time both together at once.

Bluebirds, like many other creatures, were almost wiped out once, courtesy of pesticides and other man-made niceties. 
Mountain bluebirds like treed areas with natural nesting cavities. With their habitat disappearing at the fast rate the bluebird species nearly followed the suit.
Thankfully people realized how close was the race to oblivion and began to put up the nesting boxes.
The bluebirds accepted the alternative.

They are quite territorial and willing to defend their home. 

Still, there are other species such as tree swallows, sparrows and starlings (oh, yes!) willing to oust the bluebirds out of the nesting box or a tree cavity. Despite of that, the bluebirds are making a comeback.

I spent several hours trying to take photos of this couple. I tried not to get too close, and since I did not have a blind, I left my camera on a tripod with the long lens aimed and focused on one spot.
Then, remote in hand, I sat far away from the location (my remote will fire the camera a couple hundred meters away) hoping that the bird would show up in the place I chose. 

Seems crazy but it works - at times.
.It is usually  combination of observation and luck, and if you are short on patience don't try!


Anyhow, "my" bluebird was cooperating for a long while; as long as I was far away it did not mind the lens at all. 

Perched on its fence post it searched for bugs, crickets, cicadas, spiders .... no-one was safe. Mom was on the nest and it looked like Dad was feeding them both. 

And I stayed focused! 

Just when I was ready to pat myself on the back for the work well done, "my" bluebird disappeared. It left the post on my left, took a low-curved path right in front of me and did not return for a long time. 
Finally, restless, I looked around - the bird sat perched on a fence post right behind my right shoulder.
Giving the unfaithful bird a piece of my mind I started to collect my stiff body so I could finally retrieve the camera and tripod from the location on the left.





As I straightened up my aching knees I made an eye contact with something much larger than a bird!

Thankfully the bear got as scared as I, turned back and walked away. 
It must have been there for a while; obscured by bushes and grass, peacefully exploring the ditch on my right. 
Where there is a bear there are bugs and the bluebird knew it. It was almost like the food-home-delivery for it, until I spooked the bear. 
I could see both of them, the big dark one, and the shiny-blue little one, working together for a while until they both disappeared behind the bush.

Who said that one cannot learn from the birds?

In another field  another couple  took up a residence. They were cousins to the mountain bluebirds but as far as I could tell, that's where the relationship ended. 
A pair of Western Bluebirds  (Sialia mexicana) decided to raise their family. 
For that, they chose the nest box 35.

Western Bluebirds are not as widely spread as their Mountain Bluebird relatives. They barely clear the border of Southern BC, prefering the western side of USA and Mexico. 
They also prefer lower elevations and more open spaces. But once in a while their territories overlap.

I photographed the two above in the Palouse area (N. Washington State, USA) about 5 years ago. 
The other photos were taken "just across the border" in Southern Interior of British Columbia where Pend Oreille River meets the mighty Columbia. 

By the time I discovered them, they were a very busy couple: both constantly flying in and out, delivering crickets, cicadas, fat caterpillars, spiders, large flying bugs, you name it....

On her way out the female often carried white baby poop to discard it far away from the nest and to keep the premise clean.

Once in a while they met on the top of the nest box as if to communicate about some important next steps.

All seemed well for a couple of days but then I noticed a brewing trouble. 

It was a pair of cute Tree Swallows seemingly quite determined to chase the bluebirds out of the area. They would not attack the bluebirds physically but bullied them enough to make them uncomfortable. The male bluebird would have to take after the bickering swallows just to have them come back a short while later and bicker some more. Annoying!

I did not make it back to the location for a week. But when I did, the bluebirds were gone and the swallow couple was refurbishing the nest box 35. 

It looked like they managed to harass the bluebirds enough to make them leave the nest.

.

I'll sing and protect, you build. OK?

Hard work, this family business! Where is HE, anyway?

.

What happened to the young bluebird family? I have no idea. I found the male perched on a fence post half a mile away. No female, no juvenile bluebirds. 

And since I would not go near the nest box the end of this Nature story is anyone's guess.

For more information about the bluebirds (and other wildlife) in the West Kootenay area check the following site:Dan Reibin, Birds 2015.