Combing for Grebes at the Flett

The Flett Ponds Grebe Nest Survey

On Tuesday night, City of Tacoma's Chris Burke sent an email. A nest survey of any possible grebes at the Flett retention ponds needed to be underway, like, now.

This is why: The Flett holding basin is a WDFW Priority Habitat and Species (PHS) designated waterfowl concentration area. It is also choked with smartweed/knotweed(1) and that stuff is going to go away this summer. Because nobody wants to harm little baby birds or their nests or their parents, it is a good idea to look for the nests first.

We know that the Pied-billed Grebe is in the Flett, and their nests are floating lumps of rotting vegetation. How well those nests can float with smartweeds gagging up the water, who can say? But let's be cautious and make sure any nests are protected from our human activity.

The procedure for seeking out the nests was simple enough. A light rope is dragged across the top of the weedy water surface between two workers. If it passes over a nest the adult flies up into the air and the surveyors stop and search the area for a nest. If a nest is found, it can be flagged to avoid direct application to eggs.

In other words, would anyone at CPTC like to don a wetsuit and join the fun over at the gravel pitted Pond #1, AKA 'Le Behemoth du Squashy?'?

I'm paraphrasing his letter, but don't fight me over the definition of 'fun'. I know what I wrote.

It was with deep regret that Dr. Faust declined, as he had other obligations as an instructor for the college. His job isn't all outdoor fun and maims. I wrestled with my brain for about one-tenth of a second and jumped in because after all, the college couldn't hurt to represent and pitch a hand. City of Tacoma has been great for CPTC, what with their projects in temperature sensors, mapping the waterway in the school's side of the marsh, clearing the channels for the betterment of all, and last but not least, helping us commiserate over the logistics of native and non-native flora, fauna, and...beaver dams.

A little bit about why grebes matter (besides the fact that anything that eats leeches is a-ok in my book). We need to know more about their habits on the Flett, and, if the city is to begin their eradication program of the persicaria choking out the natural water flow, we need to keep this little bird safe. They're nesting on the Flett somewhere, but the question is where?

Below: a CC Media image of the bird in question...

Also, have they finished nesting? Are there chicks?

Awww just look at that widdle murderface...Goodbye, arthropod, you were too pure for this world...

Draft procedure.?Carefully drag a rope along the top of the plants, in sections.?If a Grebe comes out, look for a nest.?If a nest is encountered then flag and mark a 50ft buffer around this location.?We will start from the uppermost pond, where the stormwater inlets are.?This procedure may change as we gain information from others.?

So wild. What we're doing is...run a comb through the wetlands' vegetative hair and wait for the grebes inside to pop out. Why am I laughing out loud? Because this is just... Just look at the etymology of grebe.

Combing for a bird whose name means comb. Awesome!

Meetup at 7:30am. If you are a wild lifeform, that's the middle of the day, you slacker. If you are most humans, it's too early. If you are me, hello, congenital sleep disorder, we've been up for hours, where have you been, lazybones.

While I ate breakfast, the male osprey showed up for al fresco over Pond #4, probably chipping in for his Wife's Working Women's Wednesday.

'No right angles in Nature', yes, we heard you, Middle School Science Teacher. That doesn't mean we can't appreciate the occasional Geometric Weird.

Wow. That took less than 45 seconds. While the picture is terrible, it is not nearly as terrible as the sounds of an enraged catfish on the fast-track up the Wheel of Reincarnation.

Below: one of the surviving wood hens (female). The mothers won't leave their young, so if anyone goes wandering it will be a male or unattached female.

The first of what would be many, many observants from Tribe Columbidae.

Onwards!

Above: First stage was checking an old site for homeless activity. It is unsettling to think of anyone camping out even one day around so many toxic plants. There was also a strong smell of pot in the air; this was not actual cannabis, but you'll see the culprit in a bit...

The native Red Elderberry, Sambucus racemosa bushes are in full fruit. This is one simple explanation for the many doves and fructivore birds we saw. A Facultative Wetlands shrub, if you see a healthy, thriving bush it means the roots are down in a reliably moist spot.

Below: An alkanet. Very beautiful, but many of its ancestors came over as an unplanned accident. It was part of the dry hay and straw packed into crates for padding delicate imports from Europe. Alkanets are still used today as a natural source of red dye, but don't try this at home if you don't know what you're doing. Because. Pyrrolizidine.?

Another poisonous plant, deervetch is at least not poisonous to the wildlife. It tends to wind up in barren, blasted wastelands like remediated strip mines, landslides, brownfield-grant-sites, old quarries, and Classic Dr Who episodes.

Below: Mullein. They only flower in the second year and you could write a whole book on how humans have used it for food, medicine, and utility.

Below: This tiny flower is a navarretia, one of the 'skunkweeds' and it smells like a really warm day behind a pot dispensary. So convincing is this reek, I wonder how many hopeful pot hunters had their day ruined hunting it down. You can find it from So-Cal to up into Canada on this side of the continent.

Below: one of CPTC's applied volunteers, Clover has been helping collect field data. This time she outdid herself by grabbing quite a lot of uncommon birds on the county list, plus some brightly colored caterpillars.

Below: the caterpillars grown up, and thriving by CPTC's LRC (Building 15). These are cinnabar moths, imported from out of country to devour up groundsel and tansy ragwort. Both plants are mad, bad, and dangerous to know thanks to their invasive aggressiveness, and overall poisonous qualities. If you see this little moth, be glad. They're working.

OK, back to the project itself.

First the team blazes a trail for the rowboat. The blackberries are in full Murder Mode this year. Not to be confused with all the other years they've tried to kill us. FYI go support a local writer for understanding this pain.

Pond #1 is shaped like a long, flat dish and the water is...a wee bit riper than the other ponds. Don't ask Chris why unless you really want to know. Also to beware: old needles and paraphernalia. Some parts of your job for the City of Tacoma qualifies as an extreme sport.

Below: Always bring protection to the Flett. Boys, meet your new best friend. His name is Northwood. Someday we'll have a logging batteau, but for now, he'll do his best.

Below: Flett Wetlands, Pond #1 with three employees of the city in there... somewhere..?

"dragging a rope, they said..." FYI when this poor guy suddenly vanished under the smartweeds, my first reaction was 'oh, no, it got him', followed by, 'well, that happened early.' Thankfully, both Collin and Eric survived all attempts to be devoured.

At which point is it acceptable to start singing Song of the Volga Boatmen?

Or to paraphrase the heck out of Queen, 'Another One Bites the Fuste?' You Ok, buddy? You didn't actually breathe the swamp fumes, did you?

It was about this time that I wondered if the grebes would just...dive instead of fly. Because...grebes have escape hatches in their floating nests and prefer to go down when threatened. In a perfect world the adults build nests in water deeper than 9"/23cms, which is plenty of room to float, but also, space to amscray.

In a perfect world. Sadly, even the Flett isn't perfect. Most of us only see ponds #3 and #4 in our day to day lives, and the smartweeds choking up the place can grow incredibly fast. Photos from last year had rather a bit more space in #3, for example, which may have been due to the heavy otter activity, merrily churning highways and slides for their fish feasts.

Adding to the aggravation: We could clearly hear a pied-billed grebe somewhere downstream, and Clover picked up a Western Grebe on the upstream. But did we see them? Nope. Darrin Masters (Fish & Wildlife) who was a part of this project, made the time to come by and verified the pied-billed. He had seen it with his own two eyes, which was more than the rest of us could say.

Below: This female Double-Crested Cormorant stayed in Pond #1 as much as it could, and appeared to be having a whale of a time filling up with tons of little fish like the three-spined sticklebacks. There were tons of them. Tons. In some places the water was jiggling as they passed.

Pausing for a moment to regroup...and...get ready to do this all over again. You can see that the wetland survey is complicated by another factor: tall grasses., sedges, reeds and cattails. Dragging a rope through these thickets is just...an awful lot of effort. Darrin's idea that Clover and I keep watch gave us some success. It let Collin, Eric, and Chris concentrate on dragging the rope and watch their footing. This was almost painful to watch; every step was a huge effort in some places.

While we never saw grebes in Pond #1, we sure saw how the rope flushed out other birds. Red-Winged Blackbirds were a nearly-guaranteed presence in the cattail 'islands' clustering up the wetlands, and at least one nest was discovered. Thickets out in the open like this are great for their nests, as it is a little hard for the brown-headed cowbirds to sneak up on them and parasitize their brood. Cowbirds like to sneak. There were also many finches, warblers, and swallows, including the uncommon Northern Rough-Winged Swallow. The uncommon Fox Sparrow was clearly comfortable with the marsh hunting grounds, and the Anna's and Rufous Hummingbirds seemed to think these oddball humans had lost their minds, and was it catching? Several even followed the men and held stakeouts on overhanging branches.

Above: Northwood has been upgraded to two whole, working oars.

Sheesh. This is really hard work. I'm always a little surprised that Chris' team can stagger out on their own two feet at the end of the day. You could have boiled an egg with their caloric expenditure. Chris, have you thought of getting a couple of those le cheapskate camp showers to hang up in the sun while you're all collecting swamp itch?

Above: Chris with his Pokemon backback gear on the hunt for nests. Gotta catch e'm all. You can see how slack the rope is. If a grebe was flushed, it would not be harmed, nor its nest. Below: while we were watching them drag the rope, it was startling to see them sink into deep pits without warning.

Above: Music of the Moment: JAWS theme. Below: You could feel their relief when they escaped the clutch of the smartweeds. 'What is this witchery? It looks and feels like water!'

And the day ended much the same way it began. With a really big catfish.

(1) Persicaria, the plant formally known as Polygonum, and while it is not an invasive alien, good heavens, does it ever do a good job at transforming waterbodies into shuddering green quagmires.

Want me to cover a critter or a plant? You can contact me here, or on my Ko-fi page.