Rebecca Heisman

Oh cool! Is this in Bellingham? I wrote about Pravosudov's work for the Cornell Lab magazine.

Western Bluebird

Peace!

Peace! How hard can it be? #birds #birding #birdwatching #bluebirds #westernbluebird #peace ✌️

I was going to post something about my work goals for the week, like getting my newsletter out on Wednesday and starting a draft of my next story for the Cornell Lab magazine.

But man, it's one of those days where I read the headlines and feel like none of what I'm doing really matters at all.

I still get paid write about birds, just not in book form! But man, I'm awfully sick of well-meaning people asking me when I'm going to write another book.

I naively got caught up in this myself. My book received an offer from a big-five publisher for a large advance and large print run. Awesome for me, right? Except it set me up for failure because the book didn't earn back the advance & my book author career was over as soon as it started. Oh well.

Turns out the cold I was fighting all week while still trying to get a ton of work done was actually COVID.

I don't even have the mental capacity to react to today's headlines. Hopefully I will be ready to resurface by Monday. 😷

In my utopian vision of the future, instead of offloading all the pointless, annoying work tasks (like reports that none one will read and needlessly opaque forms) to robots, we restructure work and society so that the pointless tasks don't happen at all.

Dear fellows from the outer worlds…

Anyone with access to the following works that could provide a copy/scan/pics?

Boles W. 1990 Glowing parrots—need for a study of hidden colours. Birds Int., 3, 76–79.

Boles W. 1991 Black light signature for birds. Aust. Nat. Hist., 23, 752.

Deeply grateful!

Also - siskins are associated with salmonella outbreaks in Europe, too! So it definitely can't be blamed on something like American farming practices.

Maybe. The scientists who study this aren't sure whether the siskins are already carrying salmonella when they come into cities or picking it up there, and it really isn't the main point of the study or the story I wrote about it.

Hmm... we don't know where exactly the salmonella bacteria originate but none of the researchers I spoke to mentioned poultry as a possiblity. It doesn't seem likely that siskins would be coming into close contact with chickens at poultry farms.

The Surprising Connection Between Spruce Trees, Pine Siskins, and Salmonella Outbreaks New research linking climate, conifer seed production, and siskin irruptions could provide an early warning system for dangerous salmonella outbreaks at bird feeders and among people.

In case you missed it: For Audubon, I wrote about some new research putting together the cascade of ecological events that leads to salmonella outbreaks at urban birdfeeders. 🪶 www.audubon.org/magazine/sur...

Cactus Wren churns out its scratchy song

Hard to believe Spring is arriving in the desert… 🪶

The short version: Specific climate conditions in the mountains -> decreased conifer seed production -> lack of food for birds like pine siskins -> siskin irruption into cities -> salmonella outbreaks at feeders. It's a 2.5 year time lag from an unusually warm summer in the mtns to the irruption!

The Surprising Connection Between Spruce Trees, Pine Siskins, and Salmonella Outbreaks New research linking climate, conifer seed production, and siskin irruptions could provide an early warning system for dangerous salmonella outbreaks at bird feeders and among people.

In case you missed it: For Audubon, I wrote about some new research putting together the cascade of ecological events that leads to salmonella outbreaks at urban birdfeeders. 🪶 www.audubon.org/magazine/sur...

In case you missed it: my state bird story is out! Climate change means that millions of Americans will lose the chance to see their state #birds in their neighborhoods. Serious birders may scoff, but this points to greater issues regarding what's been called "the extinction of experience." 🪶

In case you missed it: my state bird story is out! Climate change means that millions of Americans will lose the chance to see their state #birds in their neighborhoods. Serious birders may scoff, but this points to greater issues regarding what's been called "the extinction of experience." 🪶

A flat, colorful poster that reads "Avert Catastrophe! Home is where your cat should be" (Originally from 2021!)

Hey.

Tell people when they do good job.

When you like the stuff they make.

When you like the characters they’ve created.

The stories they’ve told.

Nobody hears it as often as you think bc everyone thinks everyone hears it all the time.

Trust. They don’t.

Tell. Them.

Sometimes I forget that the area where I used to live very much used to be the Old West (Lewis & Clark and the Oregon Trail both went right through here)... and then I get stuck behind a cattle drive while taking my kid to his piano lesson.

The Gull and the Garbage Truck | BirdNote One Western Gull’s most unusual foraging trip.

Did you catch today's episode of BirdNote Daily (@birdnote.bsky.social)? I wrote it, and it's about that gull that hitched a ride on a long-haul garbage truck. 🪶 www.birdnote.org/podcasts/bir...

Congrats!

Scientists: for a new story, I have one big question—>

What is a “good day” in the lab?

I’m looking for epic examples of the best day ever to general criteria for what constitutes a “good day” compared to a nothing-burger day.

Ping me if you have examples to share!

Re-posts appreciated!

I learned about the existence of the Medium Egret while doing some editing work for the new Nat Geo field guide and I couldn't stop laughing.

what can i get started for ya

The Gull and the Garbage Truck | BirdNote One Western Gull’s most unusual foraging trip.

Did you catch today's episode of BirdNote Daily (@birdnote.bsky.social)? I wrote it, and it's about that gull that hitched a ride on a long-haul garbage truck. 🪶 www.birdnote.org/podcasts/bir...

I really enjoyed the first couple seasons of that show, but as it caught up with the present it just became unbearably ridiculous.

True.... just feel a little weird claiming that for myself as a white lady.

This popped up in my feed as I'm struggling to dig out of a work backlog that piled up during a bunch of kid sick days AND definitely now starting to come down with his crud myself. :sob:

How to Find a Rare Bird (or Be One) They're hiding in plain sight.

Is the world twice as diverse as we think? A recent study says that for every known vertebrate species, there might one more species hiding in plain sight: elizabethgpreston.substack.com/p/how-to-fin... 🧪