Night moves
Nightjar nocturne
Years ago, I stood under a black-velvet Wyoming sky and a big silver moon, listening intently for the unmistakable sound of nightjars. A light wind stirred the leaves of a cottonwood tree. A chorus frog trilled briefly, and another responded. But otherwise, silence. And then, I heard it. A sweet, haunting poor will … poor will. It was going to be a good night after all, I thought, as I noted the presence of a Common Poorwill—a cryptic nocturnal bird—on my data sheet. But suddenly, red and blue lights flashed behind me, and a deputy sheriff pulled in behind my parked car.
After exchanging terse greetings, I hastily explained that I was conducting a survey for nightjars—a family of insect-eating, nocturnal birds that includes poorwills and nighthawks—and was only parked on the roadside for a few minutes while listening for their calls. The deputy took this information in good-humored stride, merely suggesting that I drive ahead a short distance so I could park safely on a side road. I readily agreed to move on, knowing that the spot he’d indicated was the next stop on my survey. The deputy then surprised me by saying, “I live on a ranch down that road, and I see those birds at my place sometimes. If you want, I can let you know if I see any.”
“That would be great,” I responded, touched by his interest and not wanting to dim his enthusiasm by telling him that these surveys followed a strict protocol so biologists could combine and analyze data to illuminate nationwide population trends of these difficult-to-study birds. After chatting a bit more, we parted ways and I continued my survey.
Being an early riser and a daytime creature, I’d rarely monitored wildlife at night (except for several memorable occasions trapping bats) until I surveyed for nightjars. So the magic of those nights—when the moon spilled its light onto a shadowy landscape, poorwills called from hidden perches, and Common Nighthawks engaged in aerial courtship dives whose muffled booming reverberated across the sky—made an indelible impression on me.
Poorwills don’t occur around my current Montana home. But I look forward to the nighthawks’ return—usually during the first week of June—every year. I am invariably alerted to their arrival from their winter haunts in South America by the nasal peent calls that I suddenly hear coming from the sky over my house. The nighthawk is a crepuscular species, meaning that it is most active at dawn and dusk. Nighthawks lay their two eggs directly on the ground in open areas. The birds’ mottled brown and gray feathering makes them difficult to spot when on their nests and helps them blend into daytime perches on tree branches, railings, gravel rooftops, or on the ground. Their tiny black bills open to reveal a cavernous mouth that vacuums aerial insects as the long-winged birds course through the sky. Despite their name, nighthawks are not related to hawks, but rather hawk insects at night.
Habitat loss and the widespread use of insect-killing neonicotinoid pesticides have contributed to population declines of many insectivorous birds. The Common Nighthawk is now imperiled in much of the northeastern US, where many open habitats have become more forested and where gravel rooftops on which the species once nested in cities and towns have been replaced by smooth, rubberized roofs. So I’m especially pleased whenever nighthawks grace my evenings with their elegant, stiff-winged flight and unmistakable sounds. And having one pop into flight inches from my feet as I strolled along a ridgetop on my property was an unforgettable thrill.
Back in Wyoming all those years ago, I received a phone call a few weeks after my nightjar survey. “Ms. Osborn?” the curt voice asked. “This is Sheriff …” My mind froze and, for a moment, I heard nothing more. That parking ticket! I’d forgotten to pay it and I was now late. Very late. But my runaway thoughts were stopped short by the sheriff’s next words. “I’ve got three nighthawks to report to you,” he said gruffly. I almost laughed in relief—and delight. After a pleasant conversation about nightjars, I hung up, smiling broadly. Elusive as some of them may be, birds have the uncanny power to bring different people together as they light up our days and, on occasion, enliven our nights.
Take a small step to help birds
It is easy to feel helpless in the face of habitat destruction and disappearing wildlife. But according to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, over 96 million people in North America watch birds. If each of us does something to help them, we may be able to reverse declining bird numbers.
Here are a few things you can do:
After grassland birds, insectivorous birds have experienced greater population declines than any other group of North American birds. More and more states are starting to curtail the use of neonicotinoid pesticides, which have exacted a tremendous toll on insects—the birds’ main food source. Consider supporting proposed legislation that restricts certain uses of these pervasive pesticides.
Take care when driving on rural roads at night. Many nightjars rest and roost on such roads after dark and often fly up in front of vehicles.
Fortunately, nightjars aren’t known for ingesting trash (the way California Condors and seabirds are), but as ground nesters, nighthawks can still become entangled in discarded fishing line (particularly when nesting on gravel beaches) and other trash. Please pick up trash when you come across it during your rambles.
Summer is a festive season, but if you celebrate a happy occasion with balloons, please don’t release them to the wild. Deflated balloons are especially dangerous to seabirds (they were the most likely ingested trash item to kill seabirds in a 2019 study). And, in some protected desert areas, they occur at higher densities than western diamondback rattlesnakes.
Thank you for reading and thanks for all you do to help birds!
Until next time …
P.S. For more information about how trash can affect birds, check out my new book Feather Trails—A Journey of Discovery Among Threatened Birds.
P.P.S. Because of a demanding work schedule, I’ll be sending out Words for Birds once a month rather than twice a month for the foreseeable future. Sincere apologies to those who have enjoyed the semi-monthly installments.
I received a call one summer evening from a new resident in Wabasha, Minnesota, and she had a strange noise like a Darth Vader sound coming around her house and what could it be she asked. I walked down to her house and listened for the sound and when we heard it, I told her it was a nighthawk! A nighthawk used to nest on top of the roof of a newer addition to the Wabasha County Courthouse, and I told her that if she climbed the stairs up to the top floor and stopped on the landing and looked down out the window she might be able to see the nighthawk or the eggs.
Too many decades ago I spent a wonderful summer camping with a couple of friends up a hidden gulch off Boulder Creek Canyon, just outside Boulder. (We had the permission of the land owner, Ernie Betasso, who on occasional Sundays would ride down on his horse followed by his Blue Heeler to share campfire coffee and pancakes with us. Like the old times, he would say.) Toward the end of the summer, at dusk, I started hearing a strange, intermittent noise, like some wild animal woofing. Maybe a bear, I thought. It would happen every evening. No one else knew what it was, so with trepidation, one early evening I climbed out of the gulch to the ridge overlooking our hidden campsite and sat silently, hoping to find the source of the continuing noise. No critter was apparent, but there were some birds circling around and diving down into the canyon below me for amusement as I waited for the woofing critter to show himself. I had never seen birds like that before -- some kind of small hawk, with white bands on their wings. They were fascinating. Suddenly it dawned on me that the woofing noise was coming from those birds, as they pulled out of their precipitous dives. Nighthawks, I later learned, and that evening vigil on the lonely ridge became a daily ritual for me, watching the nighthawks play until that magical summer came to an end.