{"id":527,"date":"2012-10-21T21:33:18","date_gmt":"2012-10-22T01:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/?p=527"},"modified":"2012-10-21T21:33:18","modified_gmt":"2012-10-22T01:33:18","slug":"review-of-moonbird","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/2012\/10\/21\/review-of-moonbird\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Moonbird"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shorebird migration continues apace through Maine.\u00a0 I can\u2019t help but marvel at the tremendous migrations many shorebirds undertake.\u00a0 Semipalmated Sandpipers depart from the Bay of Fundy and fly non-stop over the ocean to the mudflats around the mouth of the Amazon River in Suriname.\u00a0 The Pacific Golden Plover flies non-stop from Alaska to its wintering grounds in Hawaii (a nice winter vacation!).\u00a0 The champion is the Bar-tailed Godwit which flies non-stop from Alaska to New Zealand, a distance of over 7,200 miles.<\/p>\n

Unlike most land birds, shorebirds tend to congregate at particular food-rich stop-over areas during their migration.\u00a0 At these stop-overs, the birds can feed gluttonously to put on sufficient fat to fuel their long migratory flights.\u00a0 Visiting a stop-over area at the right time of year allows a birder to be wowed with large numbers of shorebirds.\u00a0 But this staging behavior is fraught with peril as well should an environmental disaster like an oil spill despoil the habitat.<\/p>\n

The migration of Red Knots involves a series of stop-over areas as the birds move from their wintering areas at Tierre del Fuego (the southern tip of Argentina) to the Canadian arctic.\u00a0 The most important stop-over area for this species in the New World is Delaware Bay.\u00a0 The majority of Western Hemisphere knots stop here in late May to feed on the abundant eggs laid by horseshoe crabs in the intertidal regions of the Bay.\u00a0 These calorie-rich morsels allow the Red Knots to tank up for their next long migratory leg.<\/p>\n

Phillip Hoose, one of Maine\u2019s own, has recently published a book on Red Knot migration, focusing on one remarkable banded bird.\u00a0 The book is called Moonbird: A Year on the Wind with the Great Survivor B95.\u00a0 Phillip is an acclaimed writer, having won a National Book \"\"<\/a>Award and Newbery Honor for his book on the civil-rights activist, Claudette Colvin.\u00a0 He also authored a book on the conservation of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker.\u00a0 Moonbird continues his vein of excellent, accessible writing.<\/p>\n

Red Knots occur on all continents \u00a0except Antarctica as well as many islands.\u00a0 The subspecies Calidris canutus rufa<\/em> is the Red Knot we see here in eastern North America.\u00a0 Hoose points out that conservationists are worried about this subspecies.\u00a0 In 1995, there were 150,000.\u00a0 By 2000, the population was plummeting and now fewer than 25,000 remain.\u00a0 Hoose explores some of the possible explanations of this alarming decline.<\/p>\n

The star of the book is a male knot of the rufa <\/em>subspecies, B95, that was banded in 1995.\u00a0 B95 is printed on an orange plastic flag attached to one of his legs.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 B95 is the only Red Knot with this particular combination of letter and numbers so an ornithologist can identify him by observing the band with binoculars or a spotting scope.<\/p>\n

B95 is a survivor, nearly 20 years old.\u00a0 He has been recaptured four times and observed through spotting scopes on many other occasions.\u00a0 Hoose rightly describes B95 as the most celebrated shorebird in the world.<\/p>\n

We follow B95 over the course of the years, visiting the stop-over areas of the species.\u00a0 We visit San Antonio Bay along the central Argentinian coast, Lagoa do Peixe National Park in Brazil and of course Delaware Bay.\u00a0 We learn of the threats to Red Knots along the way (falcons, declining horseshoe crab populations, development).<\/p>\n

We also meet conservation heroes: Patricia Gonz\u00e1lez in Argentina, Brian Harrington and Amanda Dey in New Jersey, Guy Morrison and Ken Ross in the Canadian Arctic).<\/p>\n

Hoose describes the various techniques that shorebird biologists use to capture birds so they may be banded.\u00a0 You are there!<\/p>\n

B95 proves to be a marvelous tour guide and Phillip Hoose chronicles the tour in lucid, fluid prose.\u00a0 The book is accessible to high schoolers.\u00a0 The wonderful color photographs and figures enhance the joy of reading this book.<\/p>\n

[First published on September 16, 2012]<\/p>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shorebird migration continues apace through Maine.\u00a0 I can\u2019t help but marvel at the tremendous migrations many shorebirds undertake.\u00a0 Semipalmated Sandpipers depart from the Bay of Fundy and fly non-stop over the ocean to the mudflats around the mouth of the Amazon River in Suriname.\u00a0 The Pacific Golden Plover flies non-stop from Alaska to its wintering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[429],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=527"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":529,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527\/revisions\/529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/mainebirds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}