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Index of Subjects On 5/29/2011 1:09 PM, Larry Bogan wrote: > Yesterday, while at the Kings County Airport (Waterville), I heard a > killdeer and looked for it on the roof of a hanger, only to find a > starling. * This is a fascinating subject, which, like war, is 99% broken glass and 1% data. I've appended recent records of listening for Starling mimicry of frog calls, motivated by an attempt to understand extra-limital records of calling frogs. These records present some reflections on how Starlings mimic, especially that they often give only one or two repetitions of a call. fred schueler ------------------------------------------------------------ Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad Bishops Mills Natural History Centre - http://pinicola.ca/bmnhc.htm now in the field on the Thirty Years Later Expedition - http://fragileinheritance.org/projects/thirty/thirtyintro.htm Daily Paintings - http://karstaddailypaintings.blogspot.com/ RR#2 Bishops Mills, Ontario, Canada K0G 1T0 on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44* 52'N 75* 42'W (613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca> http://pinicola.ca/ ------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------ 4 April 2005: Canada: Ontario: Grenville County: Oxford-on-Rideau: Bishops Mills General Store. (100m ard homesite), 31B/13, 44.87282N 75.70097W TIME: 1740. AIR TEMP: 3, light rain, windy. OBSERVER: Frederick W. Schueler. 2005/030/b, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/common call, heard, seen. mimicked Pseudacris crucifer (Spring Peeper) in 1 series of clear calls among the ordinary broken-glass Starling song. In the top of a tree behind the Store. Starlings are under-rated as mimics because they so often mimic a sound only once, and then go back to broken glass. In listening for before-the-frogs mimicry of Peepers and Treefrogs, I've had to train myself to react to and record a single instance. Usually you expect a call to be repeated, and only 'really hear' the second or third instance. In this case the Starling was starling along, and then gave 5-6 pretty good Peeper peeps, and then resumed its normal song. If I'd been in my usual "did I really hear that" mode I'd have listened for a repetition, not heard it, and gone on with unloading the car. 5 April 2008: Canada: Ontario: Grenville County: Bishops Mills:S side(Schuelers). (100m ard homesite), 44.87156N 75.70095W TIME: 1349. AIR TEMP: 8.5, sunny, calm. HABITAT: rural village, shallow soil limestone plain. OBSERVER: Frederick W. Schueler. FWS08Apr051349/a, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/common call, heard. mimicked emerging Pseudacris crucifer in 4 series of calls among the ordinary broken-glass Starling song. Not actually seen while singing. These were the scratchy sort of calls given by Peepers before they've really gotten into calling, not the clear calls from a full chorus. There's about 20-25 cm of heavy wet snow on the ground. 25 April 2009: Canada: Ontario: Grenville County: Bishops Mills:S side(Pipers House Garden). (30m garden), 44.87147N 75.70045W TIME: 1213-1216. AIR TEMP: 26, cloudy, windy. HABITAT: untilled raised(heaped)garden bed, rural village, shallow soil limestone plain. OBSERVER: Frederick W. Schueler. FWS09Apr251213/c, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/common call, heard. mimicking Snipe ground call - but only once. 18 March 2010: (at home) TIME: 1250. AIR TEMP: 15 ca, sunny, calm. HABITAT: rural village, shallow soil limestone plain. OBSERVER: Frederick W. Schueler. 2010/023/b, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/several call, heard. single Hyla versicolor call in course of singing. This was a strikingly clear Hyla versicolor (Tetraploid Gray Treefrog) call, but it was also very clearly not repeated -- this is characteristic of Starling mimicry. 31 March 2010: Canada: Ontario: Grenville County: Bishops Mills:S side(Schuelers Transparent tree). (25m waypoint), 44.87156N 75.70059W TIME: 1600-1822. AIR TEMP: 16, sunny, breezy. HABITAT: grassy/shaded backyard in rural village on shallow-soil limestone plain. OBSERVER: Aleta Karstad Schueler. 2010/033/gb, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/common call, heard. 4 Hyla versicolor mimicked calls in a series. 17 March 2011: (at home) TIME: 1235. AIR TEMP: 8.5, sunny, breezy. HABITAT: rural village, shallow soil limestone plain. OBSERVER: Frederick W. Schueler. FWS11Mar171235/a, Sturnus vulgaris (Starling) (Bird). 1/many call, heard. 2 sketchy phoebe calls in the same tone as regular calls. I heard these, and at first thought they might be a Phoebe, since it was such characteristic Phoebe-returning weather (though no flying Insects are out yet). But since there were no more Sayornis-like calls, it must have been a just-before Starling mimicry. ------------------------------------------------------------ EOBase Narrative - beginning 4 April 2005. - filtered by NAME="Sturnus ".AND.("mimic"$LOWER(TEXT).OR."mimic"$LOWER(REMARKS))
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