Nature Study: bird boxes, birds and their young

May 10th was Daniel's Nature Study group's last field trip--observing a handful of bird boxes along American River. Jerry, a retired Botany professor, volunteered his time and expertise to lead the group inspecting the bird boxed, which he had made and installed and maintained over the years. What a fun and educational trip!

We saw the following birds in their nests: tree swallow, wood duck, and barn owl. 

In this bird boxes, six juvenile barn owls (I only saw five) hissing at each observer when we took turn peeking into the box.

The last bird box we checked on belongs to another barn owl family. About 10 seconds after Doc put the ladder on the box, an adult barn owl emerged from the opening (good capture of the moment Daniel!) and flew right off. According to Doc, this meant that the eggs were not hatched yet. If there were baby owls in the nest, the parent owl will not leave even if disturbed by observers.

Our young naturalists

The kids got to inspect some unhatched wood duck eggs on the pebble beach. In three of the unhatched and abandoned eggs, we saw close-to-full-term ducklings. Doc (Jerry) explained why they were not hatched. Kind of sad that these duckling were so close to get out off the shell but did not make it.

All the bird boxes are high up on the tree trunks so Doc had us use the ladder he carried with him on our walk. On the first two climbs, James was a bit nervous and I had to go right after him, But he quickly became bold enough to climb by himself. Doc was holding the ladder with steady hands of course.

James was climbing the long ladder by himself.

On the top of the ladder and peeking inside.

What's your type?

Not able to download pictures to my computer recently was one of the reasons that I had neglected my blog . Here's an older post drafted several months ago.

One post from a Chinese blog site triggered my interest in Keirsey Temperament test. Being a firm believer of the value of people's individuality and uniqueness, I have never liked the idea of categorizing people into groups. However, reading about the four temperament types and taking several on-line tests convinced me of the usefulness, no matter how limited, of this kind of categorizing/sorting. In short, it may lead you to a better and clearer understanding of  personality traits of yourself and of others, and hopefully could in turn improve communications between family members, friends, and co-workers.

The four broad temperament categories are combinations of two basic dimensions of human behavior: our communication (what we say) and our action (what we do).

		Actions
		Utilitarian          (do what works)	Cooperative       (do what's right)
Communication	Concrete                       (talk about reality)	Artisans	Guardians
	Abstract                         (talk about ideas)	Rationals	Idealists

These four temperament categories consist of 16 temperament types defined by four aspects as below and denoted by four letters:

1. Primarily Extroverted or Introverted
2. Primarily Sensing or iNtuitive
3. Primarily Thinking or Feeling
4. Primarily Judging or Perceiving

Guardian	Artisan	Idealist	Rational
Supervisor (ESTJ)	Promoter (ESTP)	Teacher (ENFJ)	Fieldmarshal (ENTJ)
Inspector (ISTJ)	Crafter (ISTP)	Counselor (INFJ)	Mastermind (INTJ)
Provider (ESFJ)	Performer (ESFP)	Champion (ENFP)	Inventor (ENTP)
Protector (ISFJ)	Composer (ISFP)	Healer (INFP)	Architect (INTP)

So, what's my type according to the tests? Either a Healer or Counselor type, and definitely an Idealist. I was a bit  skeptical and a bit surprised at this. I know that I'm primarily an introvert, but mostly consider myself a practical gal. Or am I? Further reading of the more detailed description of these types was actually quite convincing to me.

The quotes below seem to ring true.

"Idealists (NFs), as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self -- always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination."

"The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the "not visible" or the "not yet" that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things."

"Healers present a calm and serene face to the world, and can seem shy, even distant around others. But inside they're anything but serene......"

But is self-knowledge possible? "As created beings, we can have no true self-knowledge apart from the knowledge of God. " Something I heard from a sermon a year or two ago. Profoundly true, isn't it?