The White Throats are Coming!

My life isn’t all about breast cancer these days (although I do now have an appointment with the medical oncologist on the 19th). There are other things going on: work – both my consulting work and my part-time job; putting together the monthly photography group newsletter (due to the printers by Monday morning); theater (the local Rep); my neighbor’s 88th birthday celebration (Sunday afternoon); the welcome return of some favorite television shows (The Good Wife, Grey’s Anatomy, Modern Family) and phenology, to name a few. Yes, phenology. And no, it’s not some obscure condition I caught in my travels. 

Phenology is the study of seasonal change and the natural events related to it. It is about the signs of the seasons, or the timing of things like bird and butterfly migration and when certain plants flower from year to year. So, as a person with an interest in phenology, I watch for the arrival of the first monarch butterflies in the spring and when the juncos appear in the fall. I try to notice the last time I see our ruby-throated hummingbirds in autumn before they head for the tropics, or the last of the monarchs before they make their way to a remote location in the mountains of Mexico where they overwinter. It's harder to notice the last of something than a first appearance! I saw a hummingbird and a monarch yesterday – will I see others yet this fall? (Yes – I saw a hummingbird darting about near the feeder moments ago.)

There are organizations that collect data from citizen scientists like me on these seasonal events. One is Journey North, which monitors the movements and life cycle stages of many different organisms. Another is Monarch Watch, which tracks monarch migration and even has a monarch-tagging program. Just a couple of weekends ago we netted and tagged seven monarchs in our backyard!  

One event I look forward to each year is the arrival of the white throats. White-throated sparrows arrive in the fall and overwinter here before returning to their breeding grounds, mostly in Canada, in the spring. Generally I hear them before I see them, and I thought I heard a snippet of one's song, “poor sam pea-bod-y”, on Wednesday. That seemed awfully early. I checked my calendar to see if I had recorded their arrival last year, and I had noted it on October 29th. But then, on Thursday, there it was again – and again, and again – and I heard many a “chink”, the soft call they make as they search about the ground for seeds. So the question is, are they early this year or did I fail to notice them when they first arrived last year? Natural events such as these tend to be a bit more regular than not, so I doubt that there would be such a large discrepancy between their arrival dates from one year to another. This citizen scientist may not be as observant or as diligent about keeping records as she ought to be! I’m sure I can go to other sources and find out. MOBIRDS is the site where birders across the state share their sightings.

Now the next question is: when will the true snowbirds arrive – the dark-eyed juncos? In 2008, they showed up in the yard on November 10th. When will it be this year? Any bets?