![]() ![]() These gulls and terns have colonized this green roof at Chicago’s Navy Pier.Īfter bathing in a nearby parking lot puddle, this house sparrow makes himself comfortable on the tire of this truck.Ī well camouflaged killdeer nest on a gravel cart path. Often, however, nesting birds are a source of health and safety concerns for building residents. Sometimes these nests are welcome and building inhabitants enjoy watching the birds raise their offspring. Even the peregrine falcon, the fastest animal on the planet, has made city buildings part of its nesting habitat. Killdeer build well-camouflaged nests on gravel pathways. Turkey vultures, though they don’t usually nest on buildings, use them to rest and scan for roadkill to feast on. Green roofs are excellent habitat for many birds and one roof in New York City was found to have 11 different species of birds utilizing the space. Colony nesters such as ring-billed and herring gulls, and even Canada geese, see our flat commercial and industrial roofs as great spots to nest safely away from ground predators. Swallows find our overhangs, loading docks, and bridges irresistible nesting areas. Cavity and ledge nesters like pigeons, mourning doves, house finches, robins, starlings, and house sparrows find all sorts of nooks and crannies to raise families in. Human structures create a wide variety of nesting opportunities for many bird species. It’s no wonder that some bird species have adapted so well to the urban environments that humans have created. They have colonized all continents, traverse the ocean, and thrive in the most extreme of environments. They are the only known descendants of dinosaurs to have survived. They were much smaller, fully feathered and looked a lot more like birds than reptiles.īirds are incredibly adaptive. Raptors looked very different than they do in the movies. ![]() Nathan Tea/ebird.It’s not hard to see a dinosaur in this young Canada goose!ĭid you know that dinosaurs never went extinct? That’s right, we still have dinosaurs today! The first bird, archaeopteryx, evolved over 150 million years ago from dinosaurs closely related to the infamous velociraptor. Snow Goose/Canada Goose This hybrids easily stands out in a group of honkers. The brown feathering on the side resembles a spoonie, while the back end of the bird is more wigeon-like. The shoveler/wigeon has a unique pattern on its head with two white striped-like patches. No duck may be less coveted by hunters than the northern shoveler, but none of us would pass on this spoonbill/wigeon hybrid. Northern Shoveler/Wigeon No duck hunter would pass on this spoonie. But there’s not a lot of consistency with hybrids, and each can have varying features of the two species. Many mallard/green-wing hybrids will have a chestnut brown mallard-like breast and yellow bill. This duck usually takes on the smaller profile of a teal (though this particular bird looks to be the size of a mallard) with other recognizable mallard characteristics in the coloring. This is of the more unique waterfowl hybrids because of the difference in size between the two birds. Green-wing Teal/Mallard The mallard/green-wing hybrid is truly unique. Snow Goose/Specklebelly Be on the lookout for hybrids in big flocks of snows and specklebellies. It is one of the factors that has contributed to the decline in mallard populations in the Atlantic flyway, and why the limit was reduced to two birds in 2019. Genetically authentic greenheads are also struggling because of breeding with game-farm mallards. Mallards have been breeding out black ducks in the Atlantic flyway for some time now (the black duck population has been in decline since the mid-1900s). The presence of a white bar border on the speculum (found on drake mallards) varies from bird-to-bird. Max McCarthy/įound mostly in the Atlantic flyway, this mallard-black duck took on a slight green shading in the head and a darker, black duck-like body. Mallard/Black Duck Target the Atlantic Flyway to have your best chance at a mallard/black duck hybrid. It took on the body characteristics and coloring of a gadwall, while the head and bill resemble a wigeon. Both species are beautiful birds in the late season, though this particular hybrid looks a bit drab. They either decoy right away or churn in circles above you for eternity. Gadwall are a little more stubborn sometimes. A spinning-wing decoy will trick just about any wigeon. I’ve been on a few hunts where we shot all wigeons or all gadwall, and they were some of the most sporty shoots I have been on. Gadwall and wigeon are some of the most under appreciated puddle ducks. ![]() Gadwall/Wigeon The body of this hybrid resembles a gadwall, while the color of the head and bill have the characteristics of a wigeon. ![]()
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