Bob Mount: Birds' tune growing quiet in my yard

Last year about this time I lamented about how silent the woods were around my place; sadly this year is even quieter. Cardinals, Carolina chickadees, tufted titmice, at least three woodpeckers and great-crested flycatchers are holding their own, but I seldom see or hear summer tanagers and, notably scarcer than in years past, are three species of vireos and wood thrushes. I assume that one of my favorites, the Chuck-wills-widow, has deserted my premises permanently.

About five years ago I noticed that a relatively small number of chimney swifts were using our chimney to nest, and this year there are none. The April-May edition of National Wildlife contains an article by Paul Tolme’, “Empty Skies,” dealing with declining numbers of insect eating birds that feed while flying. The birds he mentions include night hawks (bull bats), nightjars (a category that includes night hawks, Chuck-wills-widows and whip-poor-wills), chimney swifts, eastern wood-pewees, eastern kingbirds, martins and barn swallows.

He cites the latest breeding bird survey indicating that chimney swift numbers have declined by about half a million birds in 2008. Since the 1960s whip-poor-wills have declined 57 percent. He didn’t mention Chuck-wills-widows specifically, but I suspect their numbers have declined significantly.

The barn swallow is a species that puzzles me. Before about 1970, breeding barn swallows in Alabama could be found only in the extreme northern portion of the state and along the coast. Around 1980, their breeding range expanded, and by 1990 the swallows were breeding under nearly every bridge in the state. For unknown reasons the “bridge populations” declined. Most nesting barn swallows I see nowadays are in barns or in suitable sites around other buildings. One pair is nesting above the entrance to the AU Small Animal vet clinic and two pairs nest on pillars on Husky Kirkwood’s side porch.

Another bird that fascinates me is the Mississippi Kite. This beautiful long-winged, long-tailed raptor was known to breed in Alabama in only two places, both in the swamps above Mobile Bay in 1961.

Their range has expanded substantially and now includes Lee County. These aerial acrobats dive and swoop over fields and pastures, in pursuit of grasshoppers and other large insects. I’ve seen the kites hover and dive over fields near Wire Road during the breeding season and was told by a reliable source that a pair is, or was, nesting in a tree in the Monkey Park in Opelika.

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Several months ago I was talking on the phone with a dear lady friend of mine, now deceased, who told me that one of my other dear lady friends said, “Bob Mount is the handsomest man in Lee County.” Janie seldom mentions how handsome I am, but she doesn’t have to; it comes to my attention every time I look in the mirror.

Eat your hearts out Henry, Calvin, Merrell, Bill and all you other Geezers who were considering confronting me in the upcoming Handsome Man pageant.

Bob Mount is emeritus professor of zoology and entomology at Auburn University and writes a weekly column for the Opelika-Auburn News.