![\"western](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/western-kingbird-7717-ron-dudley.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n1\/3200, f\/5.6, ISO 800, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Recently I’ve spent many hours with a pair of Western Kingbirds on the\u00a0island as the female constructed their nest (only the female of the species builds nests).\u00a0 For the first several days she brought in small twigs and grasses but there was an abrupt change in construction material\u00a0when she began work on the lining of the inner cup of the nest.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a01\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n At that point the preferred nesting material became bison hair.\u00a0 The 500+ bison on the island have recently completed shedding their heavy winter coats and their fur is a readily available resource as small clumps of it can be found stuck to fences, plants and posts\u00a0all over the island.\u00a0 Bison hair makes an ideal nest liner for its insulating, softness and comfort qualities.<\/p>\n At first it was difficult to tell what she was using to construct the nest because she\u00a0usually disappeared into the nest so fast that I couldn’t identify the material.\u00a0 But then I made a concerted effort to photograph her just as she landed and on my last day with her that material was usually bison hair.\u00a0 That morning I was able to get three very similar shots as she brought in three different\u00a0loads of bison hair.\u00a0 Because\u00a0her landing posture and wing position\u00a0were the same in all three images\u00a0I clipped her wings in all three shots but the nesting material can easily be identified.\u00a0 This first image has a golden glow because it was taken soon after sunrise and the light was very warm.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a01\/3200, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0Twenty\u00a0four minutes later I was able to get another shot where bison fur could be identified…<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a01\/3200, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n and a third one 66 minutes after that.\u00a0 In-between she\u00a0made many other trips with nesting material but even though most of the time I couldn’t identify what it was I suspect that it was often bison\u00a0hair.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a01\/2200, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Western Kingbirds aren’t the only species on the island to use bison fur for nesting material.\u00a0 Several years ago I photographed this Loggerhead Shrike struggling with bison hair for its nest (notice that the clump of fur is strung between its beak and its feet).<\/p>\n Bison hair obviously makes a wonderfully effective nest lining and in recent years several commercial enterprises have begun to offer bison hair for sale\u00a0to bird lovers as nesting material.\u00a0 One of them is BisonNest<\/a> out of Colorado.\u00a0 Their graphic designer actually contacted me about use of this shrike image in their advertising but in the end it didn’t work out.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n Note:\u00a0 In preparing this post I was struck by the similarity in landing posture of the female kingbird in three of these images.\u00a0 In all three her wings, head, tail and feet almost look to be carbon copies of each other.\u00a0 That has me pondering\u00a0the wonders of evolution that could produce such a splendid creature capable of negotiating this complicated maneuver repeatedly and so very well.<\/em><\/p>\n PS – Be careful out there today.\u00a0 It’s Friday the 13th!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For millennia a variety of North American bird species used bison hair during nest construction but when the “buffalo” was brought to the brink of extinction by hunters in the late 1800’s that resource was essentially gone. Today there are relatively few places where bison hair is available to birds and Antelope Island is one of them.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n