When I was in Long Beach with Corky all day on Saturday I saw this long-billed Curlew in the parking lot between the back fence and Marine Stadium. The houses are twelve feet or more above the lot and across the drive to the Rowing Club, so I was too far away to take a decent picture.
But the shape plus that long down curving beak are diagnostic
He moved over to the grass, making him even further away, but he had better hunting there. The curlews live in the Arctic in the summer and move down to more temperate climes for winter - as far as Australia and Central America. But some stick around in Southern California - when I worked at Ford Electronics in Newport Beach the large sloping lawns were curlew heaven. Nobody disturbed them except on the day the mower came out and that just made the bugs easier to find. The curlews long thin beak can probe the soil or dig in sand or dip into the shallow water of a bay to find one of the many choices of food they will eat.
I ripped this professional picture off the EcoWorld site so you can see what a handsome bird this is. The population will increase unless we have a heavy winter, in which case they will just move further south. Sometime toward the end of March they will start moving back to the Arctic, though how they know when to go is a mystery to me.
3 comments:
I love the thought that there is a whole world of secret communication, between plants and animals, that we have no knowledge of. I do believe we may have once had some of that knowledge, but lost it somewhere along the way to civilisation.
I love that you include so many birds in your blog. The Curlew is such a graceful looking bird with that long thin beak... and the feather patterns are great. I've been doing a lot of sea birds on my quilts lately, but haven't yet made one of these. Lovely.
Bird migration has started...isn't it wonderful! Once again, we see feathered friends which are not seen year 'round. However, the curlew is usually around but not in as large a numbers. I always remember curlew -- bill curls down; godwit -- bill points to the heavens! I'm a visual learner! Take care.
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