Hello, tweets.

I'm posting this to ask a favor. If any of you find yourself out on
the outer coast of Washington this weekend, could you watch for small
reddish to brown dragonflies to see if there is any evident migration
going on? These are Variegated Meadowhawks (Sympetrum corruptum),
well known as migrants on the Oregon coast when the winds are from
the east, as they should be this weekend. There is very little
evidence for a similar movement along the WA coast, and we may be too
far north for it, but it would be good to have more observations (or
lack thereof).

In answer to Clare McLean's question about the cormorants' neck
movements, I assume this was gular fluttering. They were probably
sitting in the sun and were quite warm. Birds don't have sweat
glands, and one of the ways they can lose heat evaporatively (that's
what sweat glands do) is to pump air in and out of their throat. With
as large a throat as a cormorant has, this can be quite dramatic.

Also, Clare's description was just fine for one type of domestic
Mallard, all dark with white on the upper breast.

Dennis
--
Dennis Paulson, Director phone 253-879-3798
Slater Museum of Natural History fax 253-879-3352
University of Puget Sound e-mail dpaulson at ups.edu
1500 N. Warner, #1088
Tacoma, WA 98416-1088
http://www.ups.edu/biology/museum/museum.html