Essays

Moseying: Living La Vida Llanero

Sibley Nature Center briefly hosted an unusual bird – the kiskadee
November 20, 2011

"Bien te veo" (I see you well), "Bien te veo!" The cold wind blew out of the north, laden with reddish dust. The sound came from the wildlife garden at Sibley. Sibley's director of operations, Richard Galle, had taken a break and grabbed his camera to sit quietly and see what came to the bird feeders. He quickly found the source of the sound. A large bird with a yellow breast and black and white stripes on his face was sitting on one of the limestone columns, protected from the wind by the cedar coyote fence.

It sat with its feathers fluffed out, back hunched, and a jittery watchful demeanor, adjusting its weight from foot to foot with every strong gust. It swooped down to the lantana and perched, peering down. Richard did not know what it was, so he took several photos but did not rush back into the building to get Michael (busy drawing the illustrations for a new trail guide, or me, because I was with a group of 2nd graders from a charter school.)

Richard took photographs of other birds in the garden for another ten minutes. He found Michael standing up, rubbing his fingers, numb from carefully adding shading to his drawing. He used the camera to show photos of the bird, and Michael yelped with surprise and quickly dashed to the wildlife garden. The bird was gone, so he came back to his drawing. As he refocused on his work, an image of a bird he had seen the previous evening came to his mind. When he left the night before, he had noted the large bird with a yellow belly, sitting on an electric line, and said to himself, "Western Kingbird," and drove on.

"Kingbirds are already gone...I should have remembered that, and taken a second look." Michael mentally kicked himself. When I finished the presentation, Michael told me about the bird, and Richard showed me the photos. I immediately went to the phone and called two of the Midland Naturalists, so their "rare bird hotline" would spring into action. "We have the greater kiskadee," I told them."It is probably the same one that was reported near Wadley-Barron's duck pond, and out towards Greenwood in the pond behind the fire-training tower."

One other Kiskadee had come to Sibley many years before. This would be only the third or fourth time a kiskadee had come to Midland. Normally they live along the Rio Grande, and well into South America. They are normally flycatchers, but have also learned the trick of catching frogs, and even fish. I had just seen several at the World Birding Center in Bentsen Wildlife Refuge near McAllen, Texas just the weekend before.

Birders came and went all day long, always without seeing the bird. We never saw it again. I posted the photo on my Facebook page. I learned of two other possible sightings around town -- one south of town, and another east of town. All of the sightings are probably of the same bird. It probably came on its own. Some biologists propose there is a "wandering gene" built into a small percentage of any animal, to promote gene flow and to colonize new habitats. There is a small chance someone had bought it from an illegal vendor alongside of the road, selling wild caught birds (especially in Mexico). Kiskadees only feed on live prey, so they rarely appear in the cagebird trade in the markets in Mexico.

Kiskadees have become common urban birds in Latin American countries because of their opportunistic and omnivorous behavior. They will eat dog food out of bowls, and at pick at fruit hanging in trees. Kiskadees are even more pugnacious than kingbirds or mockingbirds, swooping and divebombing passing raptors and even humans that venture near their nests. The nests are huge ball of sticks, often on the transformer platform of electric poles.

Part of the fun of being aware of the flora and fauna of one's home is to find the rarities, the birds that are wandering or migrating, and therefore are totally unexpected. Always keep a digital camera handy and send us photos of anything you have not ever seen before! Email me at bwilliams@sibleynaturecenter.org!