Beak of the Week - Green-winged Teal

Green-winged Teal (Anas crecca)
Family: Anatidae

Male Green-winged Teal have black bills, red-brown heads with a thick green band stretching from the eyes to the nape of the neck, white bands on the shoulders, lighter tan speckled breasts, thick, dark-green bands on the lower parts of the wings, and thinner white bands bordering the green on the top and bottom.

The females are grey-brown and mottled, have darker patches on the top of the head, darker eyelines, and dark green speculums with cream-colored bands on the top and bottom.

The Green-winged Teal is the smallest dabbling duck in North America. Green-winged Teal will feed by dabbling in shallow water, and then lift their food out of the water to consume it, which is a behavior unique to dabbling ducks. They filter out the mud with their bills when they are foraging. Their diet, which is dependent on location and season, consists of the seeds of wetland plants such as grasses, sedges, smartweeds, and pondweeds, and aquatic invertebrates such as shrimp, midges, worms, mollusks, copepods, and crustaceans. Green-winged Teal chicks eat mostly insect larva.

Chicks will leave nests only a few hours after hatching, but may return at night for a couple of days. Nests are often located in meadows relatively close to bodies of water and are hidden well within vegetation. These ducks winter in the southern half of North America. Green-winged Teal have recently been seen in Houston, Galveston, and the Bolivar Peninsula.

By Sarah Lefoley, Conservation Technician, Houston Audubon
Photos by Greg Lavaty

Comments

How to DIY a Dripper for birds

Are you running out of home projects to keep busy during the quarantine? Here’s one my hubby made for me that you can try: a DYI Dripper. I’ve long wanted a bird dripper to complement my yard’s wildlife habitat, and with spring migrants on the way, I was keen to provide a drip that will attract new birds that don’t visit feeders. I had a problem though. There is no water line or power source near my feeders. The idea of stringing a hose or wire across the driveway just isn’t practical. Enter the engineer. My husband thought about the location and the limitations for a bit, and came up with the concept of sourcing water for a dripper off the sprinkler system. By using a toilet tank that fills every time the sprinklers run, water can be constantly available for the drip. I nixed the idea of a toilet tank sitting in my yard though, so he made some aesthetic modifications by installing a toilet tank float inside a 5 gallon bucket hidden inside a custom wooden box with a handsome copper p

Beak of the Week - Yellow-crowned Night-Heron

Yellow-crowned Night-Heron ( Nyctanassa violacea ) Family: Ardeidae Our Beak of the Week is the official Bird of Houston , the Yellow-crowned Night-Heron! This seemingly hunch-backed bird can be a difficult one to spot. Both species of North American night-herons, yellow-crowned and black-crowned, forage mainly at night and spend most of the day hidden among branches near a body of water. These two birds can be differentiated easily by their plumage on and around their head. The most obvious difference is stated in their names: Yellow-crowned Night-Herons have a yellow crown and Black-crowned Night-Herons have a black crown. But that’s not the only difference! Yellow-crowned Night-Herons have a black head and face with a distinct thick white cheek stripe, whereas Black-crowned Night-Herons have a black head with gray on their face that extends down the whole front of the body. Yellow-crowned Night Herons also have a gray front and neck, but it contrasts greatly with their facial patter

Houston, we have an announcement. We’re now a Bird City!

We know that Houston is a vital city for birds, but now it’s official . Houston Audubon’s Conservation Team worked tirelessly in partnership with Houston Parks and Recreation Department (HPARD) Natural Resources Program to submit the application, and it paid off. Houston was honored as one of the first four cities to receive the Bird City Texas certification – an inaugural program by Audubon Texas and Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD). So, what exactly does being a Bird City mean? The big picture is that we have demonstrated that our community cares about birds, habitat, and conservation. The growing popularity of planting native plants, restoring prairies, bird-friendly education programs, and the Houston Lights Out for Birds program to reduce collisions for migrating birds were among the many efforts and programs that got us this designation. ( Go Houstonians! ) I personally witnessed the large amount of work that went into this application and was curious about

Houston Audublog

Search This Blog