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Birding Column: Taming the California Thrasher |
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Mathew Tekulsky The Birdman of Bel Air for National Geographic News |
| June 8, 2004 |
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The California thrasher is a secretive fellow. He enjoys poking around on the forest floor, searching for grubs, seeds, and insects among the decaying leaves and other detritus. You hardly ever see a California thrasher out in the open. They rarely fly for any great distances, preferring to walk along slowly but surely, covering a great amount of territory in this manner. Now, in spite of their better instincts, I did manage to entice a few California thrashers to visit my yard on a regular basis. The thrashers learned that I placed mixed birdseed not only in the platform feeder in my side yard, but on the grass itself, just under and beside the platform feeder. So, every day now, they make a ritual out of visiting my lawn and platform feeder to help themselves to not only mixed birdseed, but Cheerios and even tortilla chips. The thrasher has a tough time eating Cheerios and doesn't swallow them whole. Its beak isn't designed for pecking at things, but rather for brushing around in the dirt and grabbing small items in the tip of its beak. The thrasher then throws these items into its throat and gullet with a small, backward movement of its head. So when the thrasher picks up a Cheerio in the tip of his beak, it runs into the underbrush with the Cheerio dangling from his lower bill and held firm by the upper bill. I presume it takes its time then with the Cheerio, nibbling away at it until it disappears. The thrasher does the same thing with a tortilla chip, picking it up in its beak and running into the underbrush to polish it off. However, the bird has uncanny precision when it comes to eating mixed birdseed. It eschews black oil sunflower seeds (not wanting to have to peck them open). But the thrasher is deadly accurate when it comes to picking up milo and millet seeds off of the ground or from the platform feeder. The bird picks these seeds up one by one, even the tiniest millet seed, so that the seed appears as a tiny, white speck just barely visible in the tip of his bill. The California thrasher works it way into my yard in a slow, methodical fashion. First, it announces its presence at the far side of the pool with its distinctive, high-pitched "chirp" call, which is more like a squawk than a peep. The bird repeats this call every 15 or 20 seconds or so, as it either walks around the side of the pool along the patio or sneaks in through the bushes that line the side yard. In either case, its chirp gets louder and louder the closer it gets to the food. But as soon as the thrasher starts eating, it becomes totally silent. The thrasher is also a terror at the platform feeder. With its long, downward-curved bill, the thrasher runs at any other bird that so much as dares to land on the feeder. Whether it's a scrub jay or even a mourning dove, the offending party flies off of the feeder before the thrasher gets close enough to do any damage with that sharp bill. I think the thrasher is just bluffing. But regardless, once it gains control of the platform feeder, it pigs out up there until it is satiated—which sometimes can take up to 20 minutes or so. Now, there are times when the California thrasher actually sings. I doubt that there are many people in my neighborhood who are aware of this, or who know that it is a California thrasher that they are hearing. On numerous occasions while walking into Sullivan Canyon, which runs behind my house in Bel Air, California, I've heard a high-pitched whistling sound that resembles the squeaking sound that a dolphin makes. You would think that this was a house wren that you were listening to, or perhaps a wrentit, or a northern mockingbird imitating somebody—but no. Pull the binoculars up to your eyes, scan the top branch of a willow, and what do you see perched there and whistling away for all he's worth but a California thrasher—and no doubt, a happy one at that! One day in late April, I was photographing a California thrasher in my side yard. After taking one shot, I was dismayed to see this bird walk casually from the grass into the bushes. I called out to it to wait and allow me to take one more shot. It obliged me, stopping to take a sip from a puddle that had formed from a running hose that I had placed in the flower bed. Then it disappeared into the bushes. Thrashers Are Great Mimics The California thrasher is a member of the family Mimidae, so-called because most members of this family mimic other birds songs, as well as just about any noise in their general environment. The most famous mimic in this family is the northern mockingbird, followed closely by the gray catbird, which is so-named because of its ability to imitate the mewing of a cat. But the thrashers have melodious songs as well, including the sage thrasher, brown thrasher, long-billed thrasher, Bendires thrasher, curve-billed thrasher, crissal thrasher, Le Contes thrasher, and California thrasher—and they also mimic other birds, just as the northern mockingbird and gray catbird do. Indeed, the California thrasher has been reported to mimic the songs of such birds as the northern flicker, house finch, black-headed grosbeak, Bullocks oriole, American robin, red-tailed hawk, ruby-crowned kinglet, olive-sided flycatcher, oak titmouse, house wren, and scrub jay. Mathew Tekulsky writes a regular column about birding in his backyard and neighborhood in Bel Air, California. You can follow his encounters with the birds of the Santa Monica Mountains here on National Geographic News Bird Watcher every fortnight or so. Previous columns by the Birdman of Bel Air Birding Column: House Wrens' Twice-a-Minute Feeding Frenzy New Bird-Watching Column: "The Birdman of Bel Air" The California Towhee, Boldly Bland At Home With Hooded Orioles Scrub Jays Go Nuts for Peanuts Northern Mockingbird is a Wary Neighbor Christmas With the Pelicans California-Quail Close Encounter Yosemite Steller's Jay Encounter Banding Birds at Devils Postpile California Condor Close Encounter California Condor Rebound Going Nuts With Wilderness Ravens Hummingbird Chicks Fly the Nest Mexican Jays' Dogged Pack Mentality National Geographic BirdWatcher Regularly updated news stories, features, and columns about birds and birding Recent News Stories About Birds Migrating Birds Reset "Compasses" at Sunset, Study Says Bowerbirds Dance, Decorate to Suit Females' Changing Tastes Emperor Penguins: Uniquely Armed for Antarctica African Birds Understand Monkey Communication, Study Says After 400 Years, Cranes Return to U.K., Site Is Kept Secret |
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