Skimmer Says... Squawking About Birds!

Welcome back, this month we’re squawking about birds! Listen in and meet our Stewardship Coordinator, Christina Whiteman, as we talk about Delaware’s native bird species. Learn about the best birding spots at the Delaware National Estuarine Research Reserve and Christina’s creative projects regarding how birds are picking up after us!

To contact the education team about an education program or volunteer event, email us at dnerrprograms@delaware.gov.

You can follow us on Facebook at @DNERR, Instagram at @delawarenerr or on X at @DNERR.

Transcript

0:04

Welcome to Skimmer Says, an estuarine podcast hosted by the Delaware National Estuarine Research Reserve. We are your hosts? I'm Laurel. I'm Akshay. And today Sadie can't join us, but we are joined by our second guest co-host, our stewardship coordinator, Christina Whiteman. Hi, Christina. Hey! Thanks for joining us today. Do you want to tell us a little bit about yourself? Yeah, sure. My name is Christina Whiteman, and I am the stewardship coordinator here at the Reserve. How long have you been at the Reserve? About 15 years. Awesome! We are glad to have you. Thank you. And it is so much fun to work with you every day. So Christina is here because she loves birds, and she works a lot with birds. And we get the opportunity to too. So today we are going to be squawking all about them. Yeah. She's been a part of the bird flock for a while. So we've got some bird related questions for you. Love it. Here for it. You can either start with the game time or you can start with a simple, easy one. I say we start with a simple, easy one. Just go for it. What’s your favorite bird, Christina? It's like having to pick your favorite kid. Good luck. Yeah. I mean, I can't say there's a bird that I don't like. Really. I really can't think about that, but, I do. I love all birds, but I do have one that's a little special to my heart. The Blue Jay. My friends and I really, through internships, started to love them. So they have fun little stories and, yeah, Blue Jays. And they're really smart. When they are in some of their, they can mimic, redtail hawks. Then we've had one here that did that, and found it absolutely amazing. I know that we were out the other day and I saw a couple and I was like, oh my gosh! Look, Christina! Blue Jays! And they're just they're number one bigger than I thought that they were. And they're so blue. They're very pretty. They’re very pretty birds. So how did you even get into birding? When did you start? Well I don't consider myself a birder. I'm more of an observer of bird behavior. I know that there's different definitions for birding, but, just let me paint you a picture. Imagine little Christina out with her grandfather just sort of in the yard. Doing some yard work, and he says, no, let's sit down and listen to the birds. And that was sort of like my first introduction into birds. And then later on, when I went into college in 2009, I was doing a few different projects, internships and working, and I fell in love with marsh birds and sort of brought me here to where I was able to explore adding some birds activities here. And so I've been appreciative that we have a lot of things that we do research wise, but I'm able to sprinkle in the little bird stuff here and there, so it's something I enjoy. Yeah, you've really brought a lot of us under your wing when it comes to working with birds here at the Reserve. Yes. What time is it? It's game time. Here are the rules for this one. I'm going to play three different calls. All right. I can play multiple types of calls from the same bird. Right. But you're going to just guess what the bird is. Okay. So we're gonna start with the first one. Here we go. Pretty significant. I'll give you one more example call. Okay. I am very familiar with these guys. The clapper rail. Yeah. It's again, a little marsh chicken guy. I really enjoy them. Especially when we're out on marsh bird surveys. They tend to sneak up on you, and you won't really know they're there. Especially if they want to check out what's going on until they're like, calling right next to you. And they can really spook you if you're not expecting them to just come up. Yeah, I've had that happen. Yeah. We hear them out on the boardwalk every once in a while and it's like ahhh, what was that? And then they run away and you don't know where they are because the grass didn’t even move. And they run so fun. They have such a fun run. Because if you haven't seen it before Akshay, they, like, stick their head forward. And it's kind of like a Naruto run where they, like, run. And their whole butt is like. Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo. Little marsh chicken. But yeah, it's kind of like a marsh chicken. That's so fun. Yeah, I can tell that their calls are very distinct. I was trying to find some audio clips before this take, and, I was playing at my desk and Sadie was like, what is that noise? She looking out her window. And I was like, that was just my phone. oh, they're very, very fun little guys. I’m sure it’s disturbing when you're out and it's just quiet. Yeah, I actually find them. And I can kind of get an idea of where they are with our marsh bird surveys based on where they're at in the marsh. Like, I can tell how far they are away. You don't see them moving, but if you look through the grass, you can see them like watching you. Or, sometimes they will just really because they're laterally compressed. So they're like thin as a rail is kind of where that term came from. I learned that from like a nice little bird book. So my fun fact whenever I'm talking about clapper rails, but that's how they move through the grasses. And yeah, they'll just sneak right up on you. So I like them sneaky little guys. All right, so our next one. Are you ready? So we got. I'm going to play another clip as well. And the last clip It sounds almost like a dinosaur. I would say the same thing Yeah. So to me it's definitely like the heron family with that call. Great blue? Yeah I was going great blue. Yeah. Because they really like especially when they're, they're chicks look like dinosaurs. And when you come across like a heronry like it's amazing. It's almost like you're stepping back in time to see them and hear them. I will never forget I went camping with one of my friends and it was like

5: 5:48

00 in the morning and I'm just sleepy little Laurel, and I hear that noise and I was like, oh, this is really bad. So I get out of my tent. At the same time, my friend is getting of out of her tent and she's like, did you hear that? And then we just saw this great blue heron and it's just like haha and flew away. But it was, it sounded like a dinosaur. I was like what is that noise? This cannot be an okay thing that's happening right now. I think dinosaur is an appropriate term. When you see their chick definitely be like, yes, dinosaur, that's what they look like. Yeah, but they are some of the biggest bird I do remember. They're pretty big. We have one that likes to hang out at the pond here. There's a nice little branch that decided to fall. So there's a heron that really likes to hang out around the pond and just be able to scope and hang out. Sometimes every day. And the only weigh about 5 pounds, though, it's like 5 or 7 pounds, I think is what I had read. They have hollow bones. Yeah. That probably allows them to fly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you had one more? Last one. Here we go. This one. Okay. Let's see. I'm ready. We’ll see. Hmm. It's kind of like the intro to a song or something. So it's like making like a beat. Yeah, it's like it's our little skimmer friend. Like. Yeah. To me, they sound, kind of like a little dog. I mean, everyone has a different way of talking, like identifying bird calls as to what they're, like, saying, quote unquote. But to me, whenever I hear a black skimmer, it reminds me like a little dog with a little bark bark bark, I don't know. What do you think? Is that? What is that what the skimmer says, Laurel? I think that that may actually be what the skimmer says, that crazy. I’m glad that we finally figured that out. Yeah. I enjoy skimmers. Four episodes in. Can you tell us a little bit, Christina, now that Akshay is done quizzing you. He has to quiz all of our guests. Okay. Alright. Did I pass? You passed. Okay. Flying colors. Yay! Yeah. You passed with flying colors. Can you tell us a little bit about if folks were to come to the Reserve, what sorts of birds they may see? So at the Reserve, you can see a wide variety of birds, whether you're just someone who is out with your list wanting to check things off, or you're just someone who wants to come and observe and listen to the different soundscapes we have here. Here at the St. Jones, we have a lot more wetland areas. You're going to find your marsh birds, like our clapper rail. We just talked about seaside sparrow, marsh wrens, of course. They're going to be really fun to hear, but then you'll get our purple martins, as well as some of our other birds that, like our mockingbird. We found a mockingbird that hangs out here. Cat birds, like, easily identifiable by most folks. And, you know, at the Blackbird Creek, we have a lot of more upland habitats or some meadow. So you'll get, like a meadowlark. I've heard a grasshopper sparrow up there. We have kestrels. There's just a wide variety of forest birds that you can find up there. So there's a little bit of everything I feel. And what I like about the DNERR for, like, birding is we there's a wide variety of trails that we have, but you can hear like different birds, like there's not many places that you can be on the wetland at one point. And then next thing you know, you're up here and you're able to sit on a bench and listen to the birds happening. But, yeah, there's a lot like depending on the season, like, you know, right now we're winter in the spring, migration, migrations coming through. So you're able to see what's coming up and about. So yeah, there's a wide variety even of like waterfowl or sometimes everyone's while up on the river. So yeah, I feel like I see them a lot of at Blackbird Creek. If you're trying to watch the birds right off the trail, I feel like, birding stations right off of the trail has a lot of those ducks. And you see the herons, the egrets and stuff like that. But I know that if you're actually on the St Jones River, they also see a lot of those waterfowl, especially during the winter time. So you just mentioned like a whole bunch of different. And there's even more that I haven't even mentioned. So I’m sure there's a whole bunch of them. But what does this diversity and bird species kind of mean. What do you what do different bird species kind of teach us about our local ecosystem or the environment in general? the birds are really good indicators of ecosystem health. For here we can kind of know how healthy our marshes are doing with, like, our marsh birds. Whether those that present or absence or even some people doing a restoration, understanding how the marshes recovering and if the marsh birds are present in breeding. But then we've also done work with other, other partners where we're talking to them with like ospreys. They're taking samples and understanding it for like pollution because they exclusively eat fish. Fish are in the water and they're absorbing that into their body. So the blood and the ospreys and sort of that's not a study that we were doing per se, but it's one that we partnered with somebody else, for them to study that. So those are different things. And then, with the Blackbird we use it for or even here at the Saint Jones, we use it for habitat, understanding how our habitats are doing. So we have our nest boxes. How well are birds using them. Like with our habitat that we're providing for meadows. So there's a wide variety of things that birds can tell us. If you just like said, listen, observe, or even just take some notes as to what's going on. I heard there's a project that that the two of you and I'm saying that like, I'm also not helping you in You’re very much a part of it. Did a little birdy tell you that? A little skimmer might have said something. Oh. But this project, I know it's pretty new. It's been a lot of fun. It's very different from previous projects that we've conducted at the Reserve. So do you guys want to talk about it? Oh, yeah, definitely. Trash birds. Trash birds. Or as the more official title is: Anthropogenic Debris in Avian Nests at the Delaware National Estuarine Research Reserve. Trash birds. It's more catchy. It's much. Yeah, it's much more relatable, I guess, in a way, because people can say, hey, how are those trash birds doing? Instead of what's that word for debris that you're talking about? Yeah, it gets more complicated. It is a long name. Yeah. What's the deal with the trash birds? What are the birds doing? So I will say before we jump into this segment of skimmer says that for this project, it's really important to mention that all of the nests that we are collecting for this project, we, Christina and I, have a permit to collect them through the US Fish and Wildlife Service, as well as Delaware's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control's Division of Fish and Wildlife. So all permits that are necessary to handle, collect and dissect these nests have been obtained. So basically what we are looking at is trash. Yeah. In nests. And so, Christina can get a little bit more into the nitty gritty of it. Yeah. So like how this sort of came about is we were walking in to work one morning and we saw like, what's that in that nest? Like, it's bright blue. So it stood out among all of the winter no leaves on anything. And it was in a bush right by the front. Yeah. As we're walking in the door. And so we walked up to it. We're like, oh, it's like a pen, like okay. And a bundle of sticks. And then we looked at another bush and we're like, oh, there's a lot of plastic in another nest. Like what's going on? And so we did a quick walk about the building and we counted like what, maybe 15, 17, different nest. Yeah. And we did a quick walk and we're like, wow. Like in about most of them, there was at least one little piece of trash we could see from doing a quick walk. It wasn't anything intense. And we brought up with our, at the time, research coordinator and was like, this is what we saw. And we all get really excited because we're like, what is happening here? Is it different here at the St. Jones versus the Blackbird Creek or is it different based on habitat? Like how are the birds using this, how extensive and like what's going on? So we sort of developed this way of looking and like the like 20ft. And below is how we're doing it. We didn't want to target specific species because we didn't know how many we would find. So again, this is new to us. This is a new venture. We were just wandering around. Yeah. So like we were quite literally coming in from our car so morning. So we were not necessarily being like, oh, that cat bird. We always see that cat bird wandering around the trash. It was more so of like we saw a nest. We said, that's kind of weird. Our supervisors are really supportive of us. Like having those questions. Right. We work at a research reserve, so that inquiry based science is really important. And so we were like, we're going to go check this out really quickly. And they said, go for it. Just take pictures. And we found more than that. They had trash on them. So that kind of allowed for us to have a reason behind. Looking into it a little bit further. And so this is year three of our project looking into these trash bird nests. And so basically what we do is we go in during the winter season. So when there is no leaves, it's called the leaf off season because the leaves are off and they're easier to find that way too, for sure. And so we go ahead and we'll collect those nests. We'll put the nests into the freezer for until the summertime. Yeah. And we, I want to say we collected about 60 nests last year. And so what we'll do is we'll have, our intern, our Hollings Scholars for the past couple of years, go through these nests and dissect them. And so we're looking for. And we are there with them. So it's still under the permit. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, we're there with them. But it's like, help them to be able to go through the science piece of it. And we're looking for, what sorts of trash are in the nests and how is it being used? Because we're finding that some of the birds use the trash differently, so some of them may use the trash. They may use like a piece of plastic to line the inside of their nest, similarly to how you would use larger leaves. We found the bottle caps that Christina has mentioned. We found, we found, in a house wren nest, which they build their nest using a lot of stick small sticks. And there was a, what are they called, zip tie. And it was just the end of a zip tie, and they just put it in the nest like it was another stick. I mean, I could see how it mimicked a normal stick, but it was just fascinating to see. It had a couple and it made me think, oh, I need to make sure that I'm picking up these small pieces of trash. Or if I see it, I'm doing it myself because we aren't looking at to see if the trash is harming the birds in any way, because that would require way more, work that we are capable of doing. In terms of tracking and following up. Yeah, yeah, because you would have to visit the nest while they're active and see, like if the chicks fly, there's a lot that would go into nest monitoring. That's more intensive than we have time for. So we're specifically looking at nest composition and categorizing that. But it was interesting to see how this, house wren was using that material that I wouldn't have even thought about using. So they're small, they see it and they were using it in a unique way that mimicked their material. I feel like identifying the nest itself are hard because what I'm understanding, the permit only allows like certain types of bird nest. Yeah. So when you find one you have to be able to A. determine what bird made that nest and then B. from there check the permit to see if you’re allowed to collect that nest. Correct. And so I feel like that itself is a lot of work because these I mean, if you've ever, ever just seen a bird nest, you can imagine it just being like a bundle of sticks or leaves in there or grass. But yeah, we spend a lot of time with our field guide, our nest field guides. Yeah. And kind of some qualifying, like we take extra notes and stuff like that, but where we don't collect any nest unless we're sure that we have the permit for that species. But there are some that can be relatively similar. Yeah. Because we for the first year we didn't have a permit to actually collect them. So we did a lot of more observation based, with an intern. She went around finding nests, taking pictures, and then when we received our permit, we were able to go collect them. And some people get concerned. Oh, you're taking away the birds like nests. And we do it when it's not active. But a lot of these were finding through identifying them that they kind of get blown away through like intense storms that happen or like the snow weigh them down. So like when we've found a nest, we go back like, oh, it's not there. Where did it go? So it makes me feel better that we're not doing any harm because we're not clipping the trees or anything like that. We're just really taking it out and putting it into the freezer for examining it. So why are we putting it in the freezer? What is that? What is the purpose of it being frozen? We just want to make sure nothing is, you know, in there that we would. Bugs, Akshay. So, yeah, I was trying not to be like, oh, we don't want to have bugs in the reserve building, but, I mean, that is truly part of it. Yeah. We want to make sure disease as well. Yes, it's going to be we have a very strict SOP or standard operating procedure. Yeah. To make sure that we are protected. And, the intern that we have helping us go through that is protected as well. So a lot of PPE involved. Yeah, yeah, we're still, going through the data collection and analysis phase, huge shout out to a lot of our team members in the coastal team who have, given us a little bit of their time to help look for those nests, because if Christina and I had to go through and find all of those nests by ourselves. And then collect all of those nests by ourselves. It would be a lot, a lot of work. So we really do appreciate our teammates that can help us with that. And our interns that have worked really hard on the data analysis and the mapping and going through a lot of that and summarizing it has really been very helpful to you, because they're doing a lot of the work that we don't have a lot of time, folks. We have other things that we have to do, throughout. Believe it or not, it's not our full time jobs to look at trash, but yeah, we have we have some, you know, things that we need to get done on our end. But it's great to have these interns and watching them develop a love for birds, because it's a lot of them have come through me. And like, I don't know anything about birds, but this project is fascinating. Yeah, I feel like our interns. A lot of times, they either want to learn a little bit more about birds, or I'll never forget the one that we had that was like, I just wanted to tell you guys at the end of this internship, I didn't really like birds when I started. Yeah, and I love them now. Like there's a new respect for them, and I can't judge because I had a position one time that dealt a lot with birds. And I was like terrified of birds. And then as I went and I spent more time with them, I feel like I gained more of an appreciation for them as well. But just watching their bird journeys kind of grow. Yeah, I like that. Seeing I'll never forget our intern last summer found a Jolly Rancher wrapper in one of the nests, and she had major beef with green Jolly Ranchers. She was like, I cannot believe that this green Jolly Rancher wrapper is in this bird's nest. And so this is our, monthly PSA to stop littering. Yeah. So stop littering, pick up trash. You know, and that's like, one of the things is the next step for one of our next steps for this part of people always ask, well, you're doing all of this. Like what? Like why? Like what's next? What's the purpose? And for us, we want to we're trying to build that science communication piece, because I feel like that's important to talk about what we're finding. And so we want to like maybe inspire people to be like, hey, I saw trash in a bird's nest in my backyard. Maybe I should be picking up the smaller pieces that I might not think are a big deal, but to a bird, that's something that they want to put in their nest. And we're starting to find, even with our coworkers, that as we talk about the trash nest project, there's a lot more that they're like, hey, so I saw a nest in my backyard, and I think I had trash in it. And even just having that small, realization of, hey, my backyard is not, you know, safe from trash. Just like we consider ourselves to be pretty good stewards, right? Like we work in the environmental field. We love nature. There's a reason that we work where we work at, and our bird nests have trash in them, too. So I think that it's kind of a wake up call. It's kind of cool to see how the birds are using it. A lot of them are or some of them, I would say, are using some of the pieces of trash, as you know, similar to other things that they're going to use in their natural environment. But it is alarming when you walk by and you see your first pen cap. Yeah, yeah, it's almost like the whole marine debris type thing there hasn't been a lot that I'm aware of talking about what's going on like in our backyards. So I mean, marine debris is still a bad thing. We don't want to be polluting you know, our marine environments, but also where we're at every day, we also don't want to have too much of that going on as well. So we're giving all of our listeners a really good, cue to not litter pick up trash. But what else would you say we could do today to help protect birds? There are many different ways that we can help birds, you know, by providing nice habitat, like native plants that they can use throughout, like their breeding season or like the wintering season. I know in my backyard, I don't cut my native plants because I know there's a lot of seeds that I've watched the winter birds like when it's snowing they’ll hide underneath and they'll eat the seeds like right out there. So it's a really neat cycle to see. So by planting, you know, native plants, but also, you know, windows. That's a window strike. We do this at the reserve. We have those stickers, decals, window decals, and birds don't understand when they see a reflection that that is not an extension of where they're flying, they just fly straight into it because they don't have that same thought process. And so when you break up that reflection in the window with a decal, you're like, oh no, that's not more trees. I should stop and keep going because some of them survive a window strike. But a lot of them don't. So by providing those decals, we do that here. We provide a little native habitat here. So yeah those are two small things you can do. Yeah. So one thing that I do want to say as we finish up talking about our trash bird nests, is this is a really neat project if you want to stay up to date with it, We do post a lot on our social media pages. There are some videos and some pictures of some of the nest that we've collected and our intern in the past going through those nests. But one thing that I do want to reiterate is that we do have all of the proper permits to do this project, so please do not go collect your own nests at home. Do not collect nests and bring them to us. We do have all of the proper permits, and we are permitted for our area and for the nests that we are collecting ourselves. So feel free to take pictures of birds and nests and observe them. Observe them, clean up your litter. But please do not collect your own nests. Yeah, no, we don't want that, we don’t want that. Yeah. So I think that it's really important that we engage with our flock. And for us, we consider our flock to be the rest of the coastal team here at the Department of Natural Resources. Right. So we solicited a few questions. Oh, boy. Okay. From some of our coastal team. I'm ready to hear. So some of those questions included. Why are marsh wrens so angry? They're not angry. They just sound it. I mean, they’re really small and they're really loud. And I mean, Laurel, you can kind of relate to being. Small and loud? Really loud. We love you. We love you for it. But really, marsh wrens, they do that. It's more of a territorial call. They're like, hey, you know, this is my area. Get off my lawn. Like, this is my spot. They're the grumpy neighbors. Yeah, I could relate to that. But really, they're small but mighty. Like, I love them. And you can hear them before you see them. And then they will let you know that they're there, especially if you're walking on the boardwalk and near their nest. They're like, hey, I see you and this is mine. This is my home. I probably have a few others, but leave us alone. And they are the ones that create the dummy nests, right? They do. Yeah. So they like to make multiple different types of nest. And for all the times that I've been in the marsh, I've only come across one active marsh wren nest. They're really great. But they're very curious. So I love I love marsh wrens, so they're not angry. They're just, you know, they want to know. They want to let you know, hey, I'm here. Okay. Hear me call. I am bird, hear me roar. So that was like, a more fun question. Yeah, but we got a little more of a scientific one. Okay, okay. I'm ready. So birds all have beaks and these beaks tend to be different in shape. What does that usually tell us about the birds? So that kind of tells you. I mean, the easiest way I know, like Darwin, you know, it tells you kind of what they're eating, like, what their specialty is for, like eating. So, for example, our little skimmer, you can see its bottom part of its beak is like a lot longer than that top. So like, they spend a lot of time skimming, you know, skimmer the surface for like, fish. And so like, that part is like found under like the water trying to collect those fish. Whereas we have a little dunlin on the table. And so that has more of a probing beak for like probing into the sand or like eating like horseshoe crab eggs. And then you have your smaller like songbirds that specialize in seeds. And the beak size and shape can really tell you what they're eating in general. So it's really great how birds have adapted different looks. And doesn’t the ruddy turnstone use their beak to turn stones. Yeah I love I love ruddy turnstones. So it's coming up on shorebird season. I know our friends in Fish and Wildlife. Yeah, it's fun because they're really excited. Yeah, it's a really great time. We love our shorebirds here in Delaware. So I know the one question was asked all about if you are a beginning birder, how did you start learning bird calls or to identify birds? Yeah. Okay. So I mean, now there's this really cool Merlin app that people use. That was not around when I was learning birds. For me, it was really going and sitting somewhere and just listening. And I honestly sometimes would have to sit and wait for the bird to show itself so I could actually see it calling. Now there are different recordings people can listen to to get familiar with birds, but, for me it was just doing. I do more mindful birding than I do like list writing birding, because I want to listen to what's going on in the ecosystem and take it all in. So like, that's how I became familiar with birds was just listening. So birding by ear is a really powerful thing. You can never not know what's going on in the environment around you, but you always know what's going on. So yeah, that's really how I start. Was just sitting, listening, observing. You really took me under your wing when we started our Trash Bird project. So I spent a lot of time on the Merlin app, and just going and hitting record and seeing what it told me, there was like birds that were outside and that were calling back. And, I would say that that's kind of how I started being like, oh, oh, I see that bird over there. That is what that picture looks like. And that's how I started to kind of learn my birds alot. That's a really great app. And it's great to get anyone, whether you're sitting in your backyard or you're walking through a park or walking trails, familiar with what birds are around you. So yeah, it's a powerful tool. Yeah. You really flying a way with all these puns, aren’t you Laurel. Yeah, you know, soaring through the sky. Christina has there ever been a specific wildlife encounter that was really like resonated with you in the field? Yeah. I mean, there are a lot of stories. We could be here all day just talking like stories that are not even just like, bird related, but just some of them that has, just stayed with me through my entire career. But definitely some of them have really been with marsh birds, because I've done a lot of work with those. Being out on the boat and bringing someone new and watching them in amazement like, wow, this is like really you get to experience this. But then watching them become so engrossed with watching the birds that they don't know a clapper rail is sneaking up behind them, and then they just jump out of their seats. I always remember that one. And on a marsh bird survey you have to be very quiet and so like, you can't start cackling, laughing as much as you want to. Yeah. And so you just see someone covering their mouth trying not to scream because a clapper rail just snuck up behind him. And I kind of sometimes see them coming. So I let it happen. And, yeah, that happened to one of our former research coordinators. I didn't let that happen to Mollie, you know the previous guest. She came on a survey. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. Oh yeah. There's I could go on, but some of the funnier ones are watching people get scared by rails because they sneak and they're loud. And so I think that's the last question that sounds so fun and also so funny. I cannot come with you because I would laugh too much. Yeah. It's okay. I think that one last question that we have, this is probably the hardest hitting question In the group chat, we asked, is there a superior bird mascot for sports teams? I mean, we all know me very well. So I mean, I can't not go on without saying the eagle, you know, go birds. Go birds. Yeah. So, I mean, what's this more superior mascot than an eagle? I mean, we have a great skimmer. I will say, is it true, Christina, that eagles are kind of fibbers? So when we're listening to them on TV, that's not actually them. No. Unfortunately, often times eagles are the call of the red tailed hawk are often the ones used for an eagle soaring in the skies in the movie. And that's not true. So the poor red tail doesn't get the chance to shine. But I do appreciate when movies or video games or just anything in general use the correct sound, because Eagles might not have the roaring sound of a hawk, but they have a nice melodic sound to them. So yeah. So voice acting can even take place with birds. Yeah, yeah, I am an ornithologist casting director. I think I have for some movie it really like. Yeah, it is like a saying that they do like getting. So I really much I really appreciate when movies get it right, get it right, especially get the landscape right something. Oh yeah. They, they are in the woods or they are in the marshes and they're capturing the correct bird. So that always makes me very happy. Nerd alert. definitely be a little strange if you were just in the woods and you start hearing seagulls, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So did you have any other questions, Akshay? I think that's all. You think that's what the skimmer says? I feel like the skimmer has spoken. All right. Well, thank you for joining us today. Join us next month so we can hear all about horseshoe crabs with another one of our scientists here at the reserve. But in the meantime, thanks for tuning in. Bye!