{"id":111808,"date":"2022-05-29T05:51:14","date_gmt":"2022-05-29T11:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=111808"},"modified":"2022-05-29T06:45:08","modified_gmt":"2022-05-29T12:45:08","slug":"magpie-carrying-a-big-stick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2022\/05\/29\/magpie-carrying-a-big-stick\/","title":{"rendered":"Magpie Carrying A Big Stick"},"content":{"rendered":"

Probably not what TR had in mind but whatever works.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

1\/1250, f\/5.6, ISO 800, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

Just over three weeks ago, when the Black-billed Magpies I’ve been following this spring on Antelope Island were still adding to their nest, I happened to catch the male of the pair trying to carry an unusually long stick. I’ve seen various magpies carrying many hundreds of twigs and sticks to their nests but this one might be the longest one of all.<\/p>\n

In this photo he’s retrieving it from the vegetation he found it in. I watched him carry it, with great difficulty, to the back of the nest where I couldn’t see him but I’m certain it became part of the nest construction.<\/p>\n

The stick is longer than you might think.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In this version of the same photo I’ve marked the end of it with a small red X. That’s a big stick.<\/p>\n

The stick likely came from greasewood. When building the dome of their nest magpies prefer thorny twigs such as hawthorn or greasewood when they’re available, presumably because the thorns interlock to make the dome more stable. Greasewood is common on this part of the island.<\/p>\n

In fact, this particular nest is actually in a greasewood bush.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Note: “TR” is of course Teddy Roosevelt, who famously said of our foreign policy “Speak softly and carry a big stick”.\u00a0 Magpies know next to nothing about speaking softly but apparently they’re working on the big stick part.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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

Probably not what TR had in mind but whatever works. (two images)<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111809,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,334,363,391],"tags":[31,57,574,211,1307,610,6361,5391,5392,311],"class_list":["post-111808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antelope-island","category-birds","category-black-billed-magpies","category-nesting-and-mating","tag-antelope-island-2","tag-black-billed-magpie","tag-greasewood","tag-male","tag-nest-building","tag-pica-hudsonia","tag-preferred-nesting-materials","tag-speak-softly-and-carry-a-big-stick","tag-teddy-roosevelt","tag-utah-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/black-billed-magpie-6258-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-t5m","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111808"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111847,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111808\/revisions\/111847"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}