BIRD FILES!!

Bump...

I'm really interested in the idea of FaunaFiles, have been since BugFiles was first suggested.

The Bird Files would be nice.. but somehow I disagree with going for a Fauna Files. Birds are part and parcel of many gardens, not so much with animals, though there in the US esp. some 'wildlife' enters gardens and 'enjoys' its stay there!! LOL. Not here or many places. There are so much fauna in the world that it could become an extensive area in its own right. I do not think this is a worthwhile proposition in the DG-context. Esp. when the fauna is concerned, the Wildlife forum would suffice to share the few animals that are found to be entering the premises/gardens. There are other exhaustive specific sites to list down fauna. There is no point to develop a database here concerning fauna because I don't see myself posting details of Elephants, Camels, Horses, Tigers and Lions here that we can know from other sources/places, simply because they are not part of our garden. Birds and Bugs are! We invite the birds into our gardens with attractive birdbaths, feeders and so on, but shoo away the wildlife with barbed wires, electric fencing.... To me, adding a Fauna Files section sounds irrelevant.

I'm also glad to know Dave has stepped in and sounded hopes of the Bird Files section and we hope it comes later than sooner! Dave is busy!! Accuracy of the data is another must and that is possible only with expert-help. What Kennedy is to BugFiles, _______ should be to Bird Files. I reckon there are a few contenders to fill this spot.

Dinu

Order, Family, Genus, Species as well as
Category (Perching, Wader, Raptor, etc)
Color(s)
Size
Wingspan
Differences in M/F and Juveniles
Breeding Plumage
Nest
Egg - colors, number of
Fledge time
Food ??
Do they migrate
Etc
Etc
Size, color and category are a must...and most good bird guides list by category and colors

Dinu – I’m sorry all you have in your garden is birds and bugs. I love to watch the mammals that come into my yard.

The FaunaFiles I’m thinking it would be more along the lines of birds, frogs, turtles, lizards, snake, and other native wild life. I don’t see people putting a lot of animals like Lions and tigers on the list, maybe bears. I personally have frogs, snakes, raccoons, crows, song birds, rabbits, and squirrels, which visit or live in my yard. I have Hawks and Eagles that nest around my house. I view FaunaFiles as a way to ID and find out about food, habits, and how to invite or discourage the animals that interact with me. If we had a database less ID posts would be posted in the Wildlife forum.

zhinu,
Probably I have misunderstood the concept of FF. Now I agree with what you have now clearly briefed me. There must be a line dividing the ones visiting the gardens [strictly] and the ones in the real wild and DG can have a database on the former which would be useful to people like you [I know there are a great majority like you in DG]. We here just cannot imagine all that! The situation is different. There are a very few people here though, who can afford to own a 'farm house' in the forests and that is possible for such people and locations only.

Dinu - I actually live in a characterless housing complex. My backyard is a little less then 40'x40'. I wish I had a farm and forest.

I do live in a life rich area. We have a good amount of wild animals around us, but generally they are the ones that have adapted to living with humans. Not necessarily in my yard, but within a mile of my house we have large amounts of wild life. Crows and Raccoons are my favorites; they are smart, have character and have adapted well to our removing their habitat. We have rabbits; I'm not sure where they actually live, but they come through my yard now and then. There are Red wing black birds live down by the water retention area, and we have dozens of perching birds that live in the area; junkos, goldfinch, and sparrows being the most common in my yard. We have Canadian Geese that fly through twice a year; some seem to be here longer. We have white geese that live here all year, but don't belong to anyone (We have two lakes within a mile and several other "water spots"). We have multiple types of squirrels and opossums. Snakes, mainly garter snakes, some a bit bigger but no poisonous snakes. We have dozens of different types of ducks and water birds; including heron, egrets and cormorants. Earlier this year we rescued ducklings that had lost there mother from our front yard. We have several types of rodents: mice, rats, moles, gophers, etc... We have bats that fly though our yard some nights. We have eagles and hawks that nest on telephone poles and trees. Seagulls come in during stormy weather. We have salmon run up all the streams and rivers in the area. River otters live in the rivers and lakes. We have foxes. Deer are numerous in the area. I don’t know of any within a mile, though there could be, but within ten miles we have beaver. Also within ten miles we have seals and sea lions. In the last year we've had cougar and bear come into the city limits.

I live in a tri-city area that has a population close to 100,000. It's the state capital, among other things. I know that not all of these animals are garden animals, but I listed them to make the point that you don't need to live on a farm to be surrounded by animals.

zhinu,
That's quite an array of animals and birds! And thanks for listing them out. You have made your point. We have many birds here, not animals aside from the stray cows [from diary farms], bandicoots, cats, dogs, squirrel, monkeys [fortunately, in recent years - rare visitors]. I need not list my winged visitors as I had posted most of them in the Birds Forum some months back. There are two lakes within two miles on either side of my home and some birds do fly by during the season. Some rare migratory birds too visit these lakes and breed there. Houses are jam packed here, at least not mine [luckily] and as such, I cannot think of those things and many cannot think of a garden either! Such is the scarcity of space! I'm quite amazed you live in such an area so similar to most homes here, area-wise.

What is a bandicoot? What does it eat?

CMoxon - Here is a site on Bandicoots (my daughter plays Crash Bandicoot so I've had to look them up before) http://www.animalport.com/animals/Bandicoots.html

Ohhhh, they are SO cute! I love them! I suppose they are a pest in the garden, but they look so cuddly, like big mice. I never heard of Crash Bandicoot either and had to look that up also! LOL! I'm so out of touch with modern music!

Do people keep bandicoots for pets in India? I would like to have one!
Claire

CMoxon - Crash Bandicoot is actually a series of computer games. This is the one my DSD plays http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MA_3kyqcys8&feature=related , you don't have to watch it all, but so you have an idea of what I'm talking about. But, she wanted to know what a Bandicoot was and if they were orange cats.... so I looked it up. I love the internet! I can't imagine answering half her questions without internet and a dictionary.

LOL, OK, now I see. I thought it was music video but it's video games! Oh dear, I'm even more out of touch than I thought!

lol... I know the feeling, I haven't had cable for about 6 years and everyone insists on asking if I've watched ____ . I actually read Entertainment Weekly so I have some clue what they are talking about.

The bandicoot is a pest rather than a pet! LOL. Nocturnal. Can damage crops and young plants in our gardens with the intent of digging holes in search of insects.

Zhinu,
Cable..... we too do not have cable connection for 6 -7 years now and our happiness increased manifold ever since! My garden grew well! I must say it is a wonderful feeling not having the cable!

Dinu - I like not having cable, most of the time. We do get DVDs from various sources. When I moved out on my own I decided I didn't need it; too many commercials and it's easy to let it take up all your free time. I've just had days where I was hanging out with friends and had no clue what they were talking about for the entire conversation because they were talking about tv shows, pop music and other current pop culture issues. I ignore those most of the time.

All - Just as an interesting point. I watched 24 a couple years ago on DVD and it was only 16 hours of programming. That means that if you watch tv for 1 day straight you're watching 8 hrs of commercials.

I get in such a predicament with certain group of friends too!! Quite the same! I fully agree with you. Once addicted, it eats up all our precious time.

Sorry for going off track in this thread away from the subject of animals and birds.

Does anyone know if we can have a Bird Files?

Marilyn

Dave said earlier in the thread he would do it but had a bunch of other things he had to get done first, so we have to be patient. In the meantime there is a Bird ID forum as well as the Bird Watching forum.

With the photo contest out of the way and the upcoming Holidays are passed; maybe he can squeeze it in.

I know he's still got a lot going on with the Marketplace--the note he left about doing the Bird Files was back in May so I don't think the delay had anything to do with the holidays and the photo contest, I have a feeling it was other things.

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/935238/

yippeeee!!!

Thank you Dave! How do you load the photo?

Just posting a note here that for the Pileated Woodpecker, the species should be pileatus rather than pileated woodpecker. If whoever created that entry sees this, would you consider correcting it?

Here's a link to the entry:
http://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/b/Piciformes/Picidae/Dryocopus/pileated%20woodpecker/genus/0/

Here's the information: http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird_details.aspx?value=search&id=280

Thanks!

I tried to correct a couple of my mistakes and couldn't...maybe this needs to be added still?

So sorry Copied and pasted. As soon as I can find the edit butting I will. Thanks for catching that.
Robin

Bear with us till we get the bugs worked out. Do keep reporting them, as we need to know what you are finding.

Sorry, I mistakenly thought that the person that created the entry could correct it. I now see that's not the case, and as Melody said, it's a bug that needs to be worked through.

Dave, the need to edit the new entries is urgent. We already have 10 entries with the species entered incorrectly (eg with the first letter of the genus included in front of the species.

The number of these incorrect entries could grow very fast as they serve as an example. It therefore seems urgeny to make these corrections,

Ken

I have been trying to keep a list of corrections. I agree that it would be easier to correct entries as they are added, rather than trying to find them later.

In lieu of a "report an error link", this one needs correcting:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/go/42/

Thanks

Opps! I accidentally added a duplicate entry. Sorry.

Here's the one that was there first: http://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/go/124/

Here's the one I added: Please remove it when the first one is corrected. http://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/go/138/

I think I've corrected the most obvious problems.

A few things to keep in mind when you add an entry (especially if you're not familiar with this database structure): The species name (aka binomial, or the combined genus and specific epithet) is broken into two separate fields. The genus name goes in one field, the specific epithet (which is simply stated as "species") goes in its own field. If you repeat the genus name (or abbreviate it) in the species field, it will cause problems.

Also, unless there's a really strong reason to include authority citation (e.g., Latham, Linnaeus, etc.) to the binomial, I would leave them off. To append the citation to some, and not to others will lead to duplicate entries and confusion.

Please take the "a." off of the species of this entry.
http://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/go/61/
Thanks.

All done--thanks!

Wonderful! Thanks, Dave!