Scaling

This blog post is for two trips to the swamp. I've been busy and haven't had much time to write my blog recently.

The first trip i'm going to talk about was just like any other. We were going to pick up one of our camera traps and deploy two more. We put our boat in the water and started paddling down the bayou, saying hello to a fisherman. Once we came to a bend in the bayou we stopped to plant one of our cameras. We hiked in a little and set it facing a lot of trees on a tripod. We had already tried to set up the camera in that area once, but we focused it wrong and all the pictures were blurry. We made sure the focus was correct and then headed down the bayou again.

We then came to where our camera was set up farther down the bayou, facing a Cypress from the opposite side of the bayou. We had had a camera there for several weeks. Before we picked it up I suggested we hike farther into the forest. We hiked past a few big Live Oaks and then through a patch a cane. Then the forest became drier and the foliage thicker. We had hiked back pretty far when I looked over to my left and saw an awesome scaled tree!

The tree had patches of bark cleanly stripped away on one side. It was very recently dead, the bark very tight. I was amazed. I wanted to get some pictures and also plant our second camera facing the scaled tree, but our bag of gear was back with the boat. I didn't want to lose the tree, so I stayed with it while my dad went and got the bag. He came back through the trees several minutes later, looking confused, and apparently didn't see me. I waved and called at him, but it took him a minute to finally see me, (he can't hear well). I got the digital camera and went to take a picture, but "internal memory full!" flashed on the screen! I looked and no memory card was in the slot. But, we planted our camera trap, and then headed back out.

On our way out we heard gunshots, and as we moved nearer to the parking area they got louder. We didn't think it was hunting season yet. The shots got very loud, and we started to get nervous as we apporched the bank. As we came up the bank with our boat we saw a target shooter-in the parking area, shooting at a pile of gravel. He had been shooting almost in our direction. As we drove out, the idiot didn't even look our way. Funny, there's a shooting range to the north of the park...

-The Next Week-

This time in the bayou we were just wanting to pick up our two cameras and plant one on the scaled tree again. We're going to keep it under our watch until we find out what's doing it. We headed down the bayou and ran into the same fisherman we saw last time, cutting a fish into filets. We said hello to him again and then we picked up our first camera on the tripod. We then headed off to the scaled tree.

We then arrived back at the cypress tree that marked where we hiked in from the bayou to find the scaled tree. So we hiked in, passing the Live Oaks and cane. Then we fanned out in the forest to look for the tree again. A short while later we spotted it. This time I had a camera with a memory card, so I took some really good pictures of the scaled bark. We picked up our camera from last week and started to plant a new one. We used our picked-up tripod to mount a new camera trap facing the tree and then turned it on. Then we headed out of the bayou.

Our pictures from the camera traps did not reveal the culprit of the scaled bark from the first deployment, but I posted two below. I also posted a picture I took of the scaling with my digital camera. It's interesting to note one area of the scaling is darker than the other, indicating whatever did it did it two different times. Maybe next week we'll have a picture of an IBWO sitting on the tree peeling off more bark.

Stake Out

We were out at Wattensaw Bayou again last Sunday. This time we decided to float down to where we last heard the Blue Jay do kent call imitations and stake out the area.

We passed two of our camera traps as we went, we were going to get them on our way out. When we arrived at the bend in the bayou where we heard the kent call imitations a Pileated Woodpecker flew across the water. We then came to an opening on the bank and pulled the kayak in. We brought our cameras and equipment and hiked far into the woods. We passed a small grove of Bamboo as we ascended the hill from the bank of the bayou. Then we were in the thick of the forest. It's a forest of Sweet Gum and Oak, perfect Ivory-bill habitat. We hiked what seemed like far into the woods, then made a u-turn and headed back. When we got back to the bayou we realized we had hiked just a tiny, tiny bit.

Once we got back to the bayou from the forest we sat on a "cliff" overlooking the water. The water has gone down so much that the bank is very elevated. We sat there for a while, just waiting to see what would happen. After sitting for a while, we heard a group of blue jays. We always have our sound recorder on so we recorded them. They called like normal for several minutes, then something changed in their calls. "kent, kent..kent,kent,kent" They were doing it again! It sounded like the 1935 recordings of two Ivory-bills at the nest. They were calling "kents" back and forth at each other, exactly like an Ivory-bill. Not only did they copy the note, but a behavior! It's as if these Blue Jays learned this *first hand* from watching Ivory-bills.

The Blue Jays eventually stopped calling, and they all flew off together over the bayou, one by one. We counted six. It was a pretty cool trip, and we have it on tape!

On The Trail

We were out in Wattensaw once again last sunday. The water level has dropped a fair amount since the first time we were out here, but we can still easily move through the bayou in our kayak.

On this trip we decided to move farther down the bayou than we had before, and we did, but not without distractions along the way. Our distraction for the trip down the bayou came about when we turned a corner in our kayak near a very recently dead Nuttall Oak. My dad started yelling and pointing to the tree tops. He had seen a bird, but I didn't. I told him to throw me the camera and we pulled to the side of the bayou and gave chase, but of course we didn't see it. (How did John Dennis find it?) We stopped in a clearing and I questioned my dad on what he saw. He said it was black, he was not sure about white. He was sure it was bigger than a Pileated, and that it had fairly rapid wingbeats. Not the best sighting on earth, but we planted a camera trap on a tripod in the area anyway.

We then headed farther down the bayou, arriving at the spot where we heard the best double-knock we had ever heard. We had a camera trap aimed a one Cypress tree in particular, but we decided to pick it up on our way out.

We then passed the farthest point we had been, and not long after we heard something. KENT! "What was that?" "I don't know, but I recorded it." Kent, kent kent. Then, I realized it was just a Blue Jay doing its version of the call. That was confirmed by a normal jay call seconds later. We then turned around, we had a camera to get.

We arrived back at the spot where we heard the double-knock, where we replaced the camera trap with a fresh one. We are going to keep a camera in that one spot for a while, eventually something will surely land on it! We have some pretty good pictures, which I posted below. I have a good feeling about next week.