By Mel Carriere
You may not know this, but the mad mysterious mail blogger Mel Carriere, whose hard biting commentary can be found on The Postal Tsunami, The Truth Bomb, and on Hub Pages, is also a closet birder. Yes, your humble Mailman slash author can sometimes be found wandering around the river valleys and estuaries of Southern California in the wee hours of the morning with a pair of cheap binoculars hanging around his neck. His children have disowned him for it, derisively referring to him as a "furry." His Father has disinherited him, calling him a "tree-hugger." All the same, Mel's passion for all things avian cannot be suppressed.
Mel's interest in bird life can be directly linked to his employment and his employer. Sometime in the late 1990s he spotted a White-tailed Kite coursing above a vacant lot, searching for scurrying voles in the dry grass below. This raptor opened the flood gates. Curiously enough, this vacant lot was the same place where Mel's Post Office now stands, so the Postal Service and birds were inextricably linked in Mel's destiny.
After this birding epiphany, Mel went out and bought a bird book. This bird book was not good enough, so he purchased another, and then another. Now Mel has an entire bookshelf filled with bird books, yet even so his curiosity with bird life cannot be satiated.
Mel Carriere is delighted to share his birding experiences with you here on Birds by Mel. In addition to observing birds, Mel also likes to talk about himself in the third person, as if he is a big shot. We hope you enjoy reading about the day to day birding encounters Mel experiences as he swings the satchel up and down America's neighborhoods. Welcome!
This first installment of Birds by Mel will deal briefly with the Eurasian Collared-Dove, which has completed its Sea to Shining Sea march to the Pacific Ocean and is slowly becoming an every day sight and sound in American neighborhoods.
I just finished submitting an article to Bird Watcher's Digest that dealt with the Eurasian Collared-Dove. Wish me luck. I received a somewhat encouraging email back from the editor of that fine publication saying that he could not read my submission yet because of mounds and mounds of articles he has to slog through, but that he was looking forward to reading it. Yaddah, yaddah,yaddah. I've received a lot of emails like this during my frustrating attempts to market myself as a writer, but this particular editor actually included details in his email about the Eurasian Collared-Dove, so I know it wasn't just a cookie-cutter email he sends out to all the rejects. Could there be hope?
In this Bird Watcher's Digest article submission I mentioned that although I have so far observed the Eurasian Collared-Dove twice on my route, I have yet to hear the bird. In reality I probably have, but just didn't know it. If one is not paying attention the Eurasian Collared-Dove can be easily mistaken for a Mourning Dove, but during my research for the article I compared the calls of the two birds and can now distinguish between the two.
So there I was throwing mail into a CBU on my route when I heard a repetitive three-note burst of cooing, and looked up in a tree across the street to see a pair of Eurasian Collared-Doves. I tried to take a picture but my camera phone is woefully inadequate, so you will have to settle for this one above that I borrowed from Wikipedia.
The long and short of my article, which I will post here if it is rejected for publication, is that the Eurasian Collared-Dove has now completely invaded the mainland United States, with the exception of the northeast corner of the continent. Since being introduced into the New World via the Bahamas in 1974, this species has conquered the continent in the continent in the relatively short span of 40 years. I first spotted a flock of Collared-Doves about 120 miles east of San Diego in The Imperial Valley in 2008. Five years later it has finally arrived here upon our Pacific Shores.
Thank you for embarking upon this maiden voyage of Birds By Mel. There are always interesting things on the wing out there adorning the landscape, and I really look forward to sharing them with you here. Future posts will undoubtedly be more detailed and interesting than this one was, but thanks for bearing with me. Happy Birding!
Mel gladly attributes the creator of this fine photo of Eurasian Collared-Doves. Since he is a crappy photographer, sometimes he has to borrow photos from those much more skilled than he is, including his lovely wife Martha, who took the photo of a Clark's Nutcracker you see in the header during a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park. At any rate, this fine picture of Eurasian Collared-Doves can be attributed to: "Streptopelia decaocto -balcony -two-8" by Horia Varlan - originally posted to Flickr as Eurasian Collared Doves preparing to take flight. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Streptopelia_decaocto_-balcony_-two-8.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Streptopelia_decaocto_-balcony_-two-8.jpg
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