Coot News

Spring Migration

Migration seems to be late this spring. About half of the wild migrant coots are still here at the end of the month including the three parks nearby. Freddie and Mollie were gone at the middle of the month, but Starvin' Marvin remains here with a few migrant coots at the marina. The anticipation that this would be a longer, colder, and drier winter than usual turned out to be true, except for the rain.

It is remarkable that Missy, the early bird, is still here. She was gone on the tenth of March last spring. I can find no evidence of any sort of a physical nest for her. She must be thinking of her eggs soon, as the days grow longer. I have never seen an abandoned coot egg.

The terns and swallows have returned to the bay during March. The terns fly high overhead searching for fish. Swallows make mud nests under the ramps at the marina gates.

Modern Problems

The number of coots wintering here has doubled every year for the past three years until there were about 120 coots among the three parks nearby. As these birds lose their natural habitat, they find themselves faced with the challenges of modern urban life. This is often frightening and confusing for them. These two coots followed me up the ramp from the docks to the sidewalk. I held the gate for them, but they balked at the monsterous mousetrap of a door at the Chula Vista Slammer.

This confused coot had dropped his Coot Cracker onto an architectural landscape lamp buried under the groundcover by the sidewalk. He looked into the odd light and studied it carefully. He decided that he wanted nothing to do with it.

Coots have a difficult time finding food inside the marina and most migrant coots eat the grass from the lawns and other vegetation nearby. This Snowy egret, Egretta thula, shuffles in shallow water at low tide to bring up small animals. Beaky the Coot has learned to do this, probably by watching the egret, but his efforts usually involve more hopping and flapping.

The small animals in the mud are most likely Ghost shrimp, Callianassa californiensis, that are common here. USGS research provides information on these animals. They look like tiny transparent lobsters.

Beaky Coot is jealous of his catch, and does not share with me, making it difficult to determine what they are.

Coots need a secure place to sleep at night. They prefer to be over water and away from the reach of night predators. Deep water with changing tides surrounded by rocks and concrete provide little protection.

Large plastic bags called bottom liners (placed under boat hulls to protect them from marine growth) provide a way for the coots to find a secure place to roost at night. They can slide out on the edge away from the dock for security from cats and dogs, or skunks and possums.

Lettuce

Beaky the Coot seems to like lettuce. Iceberg lettuce is often thought to be toxic to birds and reptiles. It simply lacks the nutrition essential for wild birds, and captive animals fed nothing else will soon starve. However, Beaky is not starving, and always has appreciated variety in his food more than anything. He will tire of something he liked a month ago, but want it badly again a year from now. This may be a perfectly natural seasonal effect when foods are only available at certain times of the year.

There is certainly moisture available in lettuce, and clean fresh water is hard to find in the marina. Beaky has always liked to eat the pieces of eelgrass (Zostera marina L.) found floating in the bay.

Eelgrass is the foundation for life in the bay, and various agencies have done several studies of its decline, and made attempts to transplant it over the past century.

Eelgrass Research links to a comprehensive study done in San Francisco over many years in the last century.

The Crow

I have been trying to tempt this American crow, Corvus brachyrhynchos, with Cheez-It crackers for the past few weeks. The wild coots by the sidewalk are afraid of the crow, but the crow has not threatened them and waits patiently to be fed.

Crows were rare in the city many years ago, but now they are common all over the county. American Crows are easily confused with ravens. You can easily recognize a raven by the diamond shaped sweep of its tail. A raven's middle tail feathers are longer than the others. A crow's tail feathers are all the same length, making a circular shaped fan.

Crows are popular pets and more information can be found at Yahoo crows, another bird forum.