Loggerhead Shrike: Predator in Songbird's Disguise

In the debut episode of Rarefied, explore the captivating world of the Loggerhead Shrike, a small songbird with a predilection for predation. We'll take listeners to Ontario’s grasslands, revealing the bird's unique hunting behaviors, decline in populations, and the conservation efforts led by Hazel Wheeler from Wildlife Preservation Canada. Learn about the challenges and strategies in preserving this rare species and the importance of protecting genetic diversity in changing environments. This episode offers vivid field stories, insights into breeding programs, and practical ways for the public to contribute to conservation. Tune in to discover how every species has a story and how we all can make a difference.

00:00 Introduction to Rarefied Podcast

00:28 Meet the Loggerhead Shrike

00:48 Loggerhead Shrike's Hunting Habits

01:16 Conservation Efforts with Hazel Wheeler

01:52 Loggerhead Shrike's Habitat and Migration

10:03 Challenges Facing Loggerhead Shrikes

13:39 Captive Breeding Program

27:41 Field Work and Personal Stories

37:24 How You Can Help

40:28 Conclusion and Next Episode Teaser

Transcript

Theme Song 0:00

In every stream, in every tree, a story lives, a legacy. Let's listen close, let's take a stand, to keep the wild across the land. In every stream, in every tree, a story lives, a legacy.

Meredith 0:24

Welcome. You've found us. Let the adventure begin. This is Rarefied, the podcast where we celebrate some of the rarest and most imperiled species on our planet. In this very first episode, we're diving into the world of the loggerhead shrike. Whether this is your first encounter with this fascinating bird or you're already a big fan, get ready to fall in love with this unique predator. The loggerhead shrike is a songbird about the size of a robin, with striking gray, white, and black feathers. But don't be fooled by its charming appearance. This bird has a taste for blood. Yes, you heard that right. We'll reveal more about its surprising hunting habits shortly. Once common across the grasslands of southern Canada all the way down to Mexico, this fierce little predator is now facing steep population decline. To help us uncover the story of the loggerhead shrike, we're joined by Hazel Wheeler, Conservation Programs Director at Wildlife Preservation Canada. Hazel has dedicated more than a decade to protecting this species, breathing countless shrike bites, but never biting back. Their work in Ontario has been pivotal in keeping these birds from vanishing from the wild altogether. So buckle up, we're taking you straight into the heart of Ontario's grasslands to explore the life, challenges, and the future of the iconic loggerhead shrike. Loggerhead shrike, pretty cool bird, but not, you know, as well known as say, your robins and your cardinals. So for people who aren't familiar with it, Where can we find it?

Hazel Wheeler 2:04

Yeah, so loggerhead shrikes, arguably the best bird, but I might be biased. so they are a songbird, they are about the size of a robin but the really cool thing about them is they're fully predatory. So they will eat birds. Invertebrate prey, crickets, grasshoppers, that. But they can kill and eat larger prey, vertebrate prey, so you know, snakes, frogs, other songbirds. and yeah. So they're basically, they're like a songbird, but they have the habits of a hawk or an eagle. The about this though is, because they're so small and they are songbirds, songbird's feet aren't, you know, thought of as very strong necessarily. They're really good for perching, not really good for much else. Whereas birds of prey, they have the really strong feet and talons that, you Let them kind of manipulate the food that they're eating. Shrikes don't have that. So, what they have evolved is this really cool way of, of handling their prey. Where if they catch and kill something that's too big for them to eat in one go, they'll impale it on a thorn or barbed wire And it's from this awesome or gruesome behavior, take your adjective, that they've been nicknamed the butcher bird.

Meredith 3:22

have loggerhead shrikes or all shrikes do this behavior?

Hazel Wheeler 3:29

Yeah, so this is, this is a behavior across shrikes. where I am in Ontario there are two spots where you can find loggerhead shrikes. They're here through the summer but there's another species of shrike, the northern shrike, that you can find throughout southern Ontario in the winter. They're a bit nomadic though, and that they actually breed farther north, on the edge of the boreal forest. But yeah, they both have this behavior. So if you ever find something in the winter, then you might have a northern shrike in your area as well. Yeah, or it's just something really weird happening with your neighbors. hopefully it's a loggerhead shrike. Yeah, but I mean, the likelihood of running into these kinds of things, it's, are pretty rare. So, like I said, there's two spots where you can find them in Ontario. So, We pretty much only find them on cattle pastures at this point, so one spot is an area known as the Cardinalvar, which is about a half an hour east of Orillia, or hour and a half north of Toronto. The other spot is the Napanee limestone plain out near Kingston. but this is pretty much the only spots we can find them breeding now in Ontario.

Meredith 4:37

And or do they go like, cause I never really think of them as like super Southern. So where do they go in the winter?

Hazel Wheeler 4:48

Yeah, so the birds that we have here in Ontario, they are short distance migrant. So, they'll go into kind of the the central and eastern states. Like we have, we have some our birds showing up in like Virginia or Delaware. The farthest south that we've bird was in I basically right on the border between North and South Carolina. And any time we trap a bird we put color bands on it so that we can identify them later on. These birds, they'll kind of be from that point, wintering from that point south. but there are other shrikes that You can find further south even, so even down into Mexico. There's a bunch of different shrikes all across North America. So you can find them from, you know, Mexico, California, all the way up to Ontario.

Meredith 5:42

the program and how that runs, but also subspecies. So where do you want to start? Do you want to talk about? about your loggerhead Shrike program and what that looks like or more about the importance of like What is the subspecies and and why are we protecting the one we have here in Ontario?

Hazel Wheeler 6:00

We can start with subspecies. Yeah, the subspecies that we have here in Ontario it's the, the migrant subspecies, or the, the migrant loggerhead trike, or the eastern loggerhead trike and, yeah, like I said, subspecies all across North America, look pretty much the same but there are some genetic differences, so, you know, they were, they were first spotted and it's split into all these different subspecies but there have been, you know, now that we have genetic methods, people have looked at them, and it's basically the same scheme as they set up in the thirties, except what we found was the birds that we have here in Ontario are actually genetically different. So distinct genetic subspecies. So yeah, what we have here in Ontario is really quite rare. And it's an interesting thing. Like you kind of look at this and say, Okay, well, if the subspecies only found in this one spot, like what's so special about them? And it's I mean, on the surface, you look at them, they all look basically the same. So like on the surface, what's so special about them? Not much, but any subspecies that we have, you know, it has adapted to live in a certain environment. So, so though our birds here in Ontario might not look different from birds you would find, say in Tennessee, there is something about them that has adapted them to living in this environment. And it's not, Like we could necessarily just pick up some birds from another spot and plop them down here and they do just as well. So, I see a lot of value in protecting what we have because we don't really know exactly what makes us special, but we know that it's special.

Meredith 7:41

I guess also when we're talking about protecting species it's really important to of protect, you know, guess species that are going to be able to adapt to new environments or at the edge of habitats, because we don't really know what their habitats are going to look like in the future with climate change and range shrinkage or expansion. So these populations are probably really important to protect if it's going to give perhaps the species a better shot by having that diversity or that genetic diversity.

Hazel Wheeler 8:14

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, More diversity means more resilient. Right? And, and we don't really know what sorts of changes we're going to be facing. It's really interesting. There was a report put out by U. S. Geological Survey last year, two years ago, within the last couple of years. And they actually identified Loggerhead shrike as a climate stable species. I'm curious how they defined that. I mean, I kind of need to dig more, but, because tri sort grassland species, there could potentially be some range expansion northward if, you know, things do get a little bit drier and there's more opportunities for, for grassland and pasture land. there might not have been before.

Meredith 9:02

shrikes so specialized that habitat?

Hazel Wheeler 9:07

Yeah, so, they're a visual predator. They're, they're also a sit and wait predator. So they need pretty open areas where they can just kind of scan around and look for prey. So they'll, they'll sit on some sort of hunting perch and just scan around. They can spot prey up to 30 meters away. and then they'll just kind of. And then fly out and swoop down on it like a little ogre and kill it and eat it. yeah, one of the neat things actually kind of associated with this kind of vision in grassland areas, which of course could be pretty bright, pretty sunny. The black mask that they have, which goes over their entire eye, it kind of acts the same way as you know, like a Sports players football players will put like the black underneath their eye to stop the glare. So their black mask actually has a bit of the same function. So it controls glare so that they can see better in bright conditions.

Meredith 10:06

And is that one of the reasons they're at risk? I, are a little bit in trouble, especially here in Ontario. They seem to be, and pasture land just seems to be what gets developed first. What are, what are the threats to loggerhead shrike?

Hazel Wheeler 10:24

Yeah. So the threats for loggerhead strike, I mean, it's, it's a whole gamut of things, you know, it's, it's not. Sometimes I wish there was that kind of silver bullet thing that we could just, we could just fix this one thing everything is saved and wonderful. But. It's not that for shrinks. So, you know, habitat loss and habitat degradation are big things. So, so yeah, loss of grassland habitat, loss of these kind of rough pasture lands. So they need, they need habitats with scattered perches where they can either hunt from or where they can build their nests. So if you get into these areas where, where cattle production is more kind of, you know, Just a big wide open field filled with cattle and grass and nothing else that doesn't really work for strikes. So little bit more rough. A lot of these areas, Are being lost either through, you know, vegetation growing up so you can get like succession. So in Napanee, especially, you get a lot of red cedars. They just grew up real fast. So lot of our work does often focus on managing vegetation in these kinds of areas. But also cattle industry isn't exactly booming. So, Pastures are just kind of lost. If you know, people are getting out of this game. Maybe it's sold for development. Even just, you know, the greater Toronto area. I mean, the Cardinal fire, as I said, is about an hour and a half. It's a little bit far away from Toronto, but. It's kind of becoming a bedroom community. You know, like as soon as there are highways up there, they're going to start building a lot more houses. So a lot of a lot of habitat is just kind of being lost to development or being cut up into smaller pieces. Yeah, so those are probably two of the leading causes. But I mean, at this point, the population in Ontario, it's so small, so we're just kind of dealing with a very small population that is a very susceptible. So All kinds of things could be affecting at this point. So road related mortality you know, shrikes are one of the first migratory birds to show up in Ontario. So they can be here, you know, as early as late March. And when they come up that early, There aren't a lot of insects around, of course, but one of the first places to warm up is going to be the roadways, so you can have a lot of like, a lot of bug activity along the shoulders, which means that shrikes are hunting along those shoulders, which means that they can easily be hit by a car driving through. So, we also are trying to keep track of nest predation because, again, You have this very small population, and any kind loss is, is a big issue, something that we try to track. Yeah, and then even things like West Nile virus. So, shrikes are extremely susceptible to West Nile virus, to the point that, we now, vaccinate the birds that we have in the captive breeding population against it. Yeah, so there's, there are a lot of things that are kind of interacting to, to affect these birds and kind of. down.

Meredith 13:34

program at trying to help the population of loggerhead shrike. So how are you guys combating it? What actions are you taking? I know you guys have a breeding program, so I'd love to hear more about what a captive breeding program looks like and if there's been any successes. So far,

Hazel Wheeler 14:13

So for Shrike, you know, the population at this point, the breeding population last year or this past summer was, you know, less than 50 individuals that we found in the wild. So we're talking about a really, really small population. So yeah, we have a captive breeding and release program that's been going on. It started in the late 90s. It was actually started by Environment Canada, and it was 2003 that they asked us to take over of it. So we've been doing it since then. This involves, we have this captive population. Every year we have a population biologist kind of tell us who should who should be matched up. So, there's a, there's a stud book like, you know, of animal breeding to make sure that we're. we're. Pairing up these animals in a way to kind of keep the, the genetics strong, you know, to manage inbreeding basically in the population. And yeah, then every year we release all of those juveniles that are hatched from the captive breeding, breeding the wild to try to bolster, wild population. So yeah, at this point, We coordinate the program, but we have a whole network of partners that we rely on to help us out with this. So, all of our breeding happens at partner facilities. So that includes here in Ontario, we have Toronto Zoo and African Lion Safari. There's also a Park Omega In Quebec. In the states, we have the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in Virginia Nashville Zoo down in Tennessee. And the National Aviary in Pittsburgh. So we have these six facilities now that all have our Ontario captive birds, and they're all breeding in this kind of coordinated program. And then released up here in Ontario. It's a program that's been going on for a long time, clearly. I mean, we took over in 2003. So it's been years now. Yeah. As far as successes we've done a really good job of leveling off the declines. So, we still have birds on the landscape here in Ontario, which if we didn't have this captive breeding program, we wouldn't. So that's, that's It's a success. Now, we haven't quite managed to turn it around and get increases in the population. But that's something that, of course, we're working on. Like, that's the goal. You know, we have this captive breeding program, but we don't want to have a captive breeding program. The goal is to not have to do this and for the population to be self sustaining. But yeah. So, yeah. We've done a lot of modeling, and we actually have this, this really big collaborative process the past few years. It was cross border, so Canadian and U. S. folks all getting together a plan for how to recover loggerhead shrikes. Because, I mean, here in Ontario, we have a very, very small population, but it's not isolated to us. Like, there are declines happening. In all subspecies all across their range. But yeah, part of this, though, was a lot of modeling to kind of come up with those numbers that we need to reach to hopefully turn the population around. So we do get to see those sustained increases.

Meredith 17:26

individuals, it seems like the only way. We're able to keep these birds going is through this program, but yeah, obviously, the dream would be to not need it. I agree with you. Is it just because of the threats you were you were talking about are are so strong? Like, I didn't even really think about the road mortality aspect, especially for. right? Like if there's under 50 individuals and their clutch size like? Like, I'm guessing these aren't birds that are, you know, like quail that are putting out 13 babies a year.

Hazel Wheeler 18:04

no, I wish. Usually around five, but they can be up to seven. I mean, five is the average clutch size. But I mean, that's one of the things that we've actually been, seeing in Ontario is the average number of birds that are being fledged out of each clutch is lower. Than we want it to be. So I think our average right now, because I mean, you know, you have some, some nests that just fail and don't produce any young, but we might be around like one and a half to two per, per nest. So that's actually been, that's like one of the things that we were talking about a lot is like, okay, well what do we do to increase this? Because that's one of the spots. Like, if we can get more young and coming out of these nests in the wild. then could have a really big impact on the wild population.

Meredith 18:55

Yeah. Cause one and a a replacement rate. Even like, how long do these birds live?

Hazel Wheeler 19:04

Yeah, so, in the wild, we've had birds that I think six or seven years old. So we can tell because we banded them in a certain year, and of course they get aged in that. in that year. And then we can say each, each year that we see it returning. So we've seen birds coming back that are about seven years old. That's the most that I've seen in the wild. But in the captive, I mean, you know, these birds are, they don't have threats to deal with like they do in the wild. So we have had birds live up to 15 years old. it, which it creates an interesting problem because these birds, they can't just keep. Reproducing ad nauseum. So, well, actually, the males can, they pretty much, they can keep going and keep until, until they, reach their happy end. But the females, it's usually around nine or ten years old. That's kind of when they reach a point that they, they kind of move into like a non reproductive state. So yeah, at that point, then we just have these birds that are held in the captive population, in a way they're not really contributing to the recovery of the wild population anymore. So it's, it's this interesting management problem where holding space is at a premium. and, then there is these, these birds that, you know, we will hold them until they die. You know, we, we don't want to like euthanize them just because they've reached, you know, the end of their reproductive life. But it can be challenging to figure out what to do with them.

Meredith 20:32

And you also are reared in captivity, you must be keeping. percentage as well to increase or diversify the captive population. So space could be at a premium..

Hazel Wheeler 20:47

yeah, absolutely. And I mean, you know, there's every year there's going to be mortality as well. So we, we hold back some number of the young to kind of fill up the spaces and make sure that the are like cycling and looking good. And then the rest, the rest will be released.

Meredith 21:04

how many

Hazel Wheeler 21:08

Our goal has been to release about 100 or at least 100. And we're doing a pretty good job of reaching that. had a huge impact

Meredith 21:19

this

Hazel Wheeler 21:23

in 2020, we didn't even know if we were going to be able to transfer any of the young that were produced in the captive population across the border for release. So we basically just had to say, okay, there's no breeding this year, just nothing. So 2020, we went from, you know, I think it was like 120, 130 in 2020.. Thank you. down to seven in 2020. that, that was hard. And we've been kind of rebuilding, like it's, it's just, it's kind of taken us some time to get our momentum so this past year we released about 50. But yeah, there's still room for improvement there. So we still want to get back up to releasing at least a hundred. we have done some modeling that showed. So, 150 birds is is target with that. We might start seeing some of those increases in the wild population. really kind of where we want to get to., it's it's a challenging thing. We're releasing these birds as juveniles. But you know, the life of a migratory songbird is not an easy one I think in the wild, if you look at the literature about loggerhead shrikes, you can have return rates around like three to 5 percent for like young of the year. We do a lot better than that with the birds that we release. So, our return rates are usually 10 percent sometimes even up to 15 percent So we know that we're producing birds that are, you know, fit and they're able to. Migrate and survive and actually come back and we've seen our captive release birds breeding then producing young in the wild. So they're doing what we want them to be doing. They're doing what is needed to sustain the population, but it's just kind of reaching that threshold. And managing the threats that we start to see more survival and those increases.

Meredith 23:16

And People love it. I love their rarities. They love to go find rarities. Are there conflicts with the birding community, like disturbing nesting or just disturbing the species? Do we, the Cardinalvar is a very popular bird. Birding spot, period. Okay.

Hazel Wheeler 23:38

Yes. Yeah. So you know what? I'll say by and large, birders are fantastic. Birders are actually really helpful for us because, you know, we are a non profit. So we put out, we put out field teams, in Carden and Napanee to, to try to find all the occupied territories. And then we will monitor those birds. But, you know, Ontario is a pretty big place and we can't have eyes everywhere. So having birders that, you know, Find strikes and then report them. It's actually really helpful for us. So that's fantastic. And sometimes there are conflicts. if you or any of your listeners have gone to Cardin, you might have seen There are signs on some fences, which is like a big kind of that cartoon red like no bird watching. And there have been conflicts because a lot of these birds are on private properties. They are on working properties, like these, these properties are of the farmers that are working them. And there is a small minority of birders who will take advantage of, you know, what seems to be a fairly open area, and they'll trespass, and they'll get too close to nests. So it does happen. It's rare, but it can be one of those instances of One bad apple ruining the whole bunch because that kind of behavior, if a landowner does see it, they can get very defensive, rightly so, about people trespassing, and then they don't want to work with people. So then we show up in the area and we're working with these birds and trying to recover them. And suddenly we, we can't get onto a property to monitor a nest because they've had some bad, interactions with the public in the past. So. It has been an issue at times. We do a lot of work to try to kind of manage the public in this way. I mean, there are a few sites that you can go to that are like public property and also they're, they're well known Shrike sites. So if you're looking for Shrikes, if you go on eBird, you'll see the the public spots where you can always find the Shrikes, go look at them there. Or if you do see them on private property, stay on the roadside. That's all we really ask.

Meredith 25:56

generally spotting birds.

Hazel Wheeler 26:00

We've got these fancy optics. Let's use them.

Meredith 26:03

I love glad that there is like a positive the community science that can come out of the observations from that can be really, really powerful. And I mean, it'd be great if one day you found a new population because a birder was. Maybe I don't want a different Alvar and

Hazel Wheeler 26:22

hmm.

Meredith 26:23

they, maybe they, show up. That would be very cool. But yes, stay, stay off of properties. It's generally a pretty good rule and yeah, as a birder, I've actually never seen one in the wild before, but I did in the Toronto zoo because they do have a couple of birds, available in the America's pavilion. So that's another way, if you would like to see them, really up close. Go to the zoo.

Hazel Wheeler 26:47

hmm. And I mean, you know what? Even like, we're really big on public outreach as well. So I mean, I can't promise this to everybody. But if people come to us, and they say wanted a tour of one of our field sites, or they wanted to see what the what the cages are like, where we do where we run our releases, like, We'll show you we want to talk about it. We want people to know what we're doing so that they can in turn tell people about it because for people to protect something they need to like know about it. So we we want everybody to be talking about the species and all the species that we work with. That so that they care and that they they do what they can to protect it.

Meredith 27:32

I'm the bird cages And, the breeding sites. That would be amazing.

Hazel Wheeler 27:40

Yeah, of course.

Meredith 27:41

And, does studying these birds look like? the life look like for you versus the bird?

Hazel Wheeler 28:06

get up, with the sun, you've kind of got your list of, of sites where the birds, We're either going to look to see if the birds are there, or we have sites where we going to just kind of keep track of them. And it really is, at the start of the season, it is just a lot of wandering around in fields. Which can be kind of amazing, because this is kind of, you know, rural Ontario, where, you know, It can feel a little bit isolating, but you know, you're always kind of along roadsides. But for the properties Where we have access, some of them are really, really big. there is 11 spot in particular, in Carden, where doing a survey of this one site can take seven hours just walking around. This is Carden Alvaro Provincial Park, there are some trails along along one edge, but, it's largely close to the public because it is actually it's a provincial park that has cattle pasturing going on inside. But, just wandering around, looking for birds. I mean, shrikes are songbirds, but they don't tend to sing very often. You're most likely to hear them early in the spring, you might have a male up on a lookout lookout perch, just kind of singing but, yeah, once we find the birds, then yeah. One of the strengths of our program, I think, is we have done a ton of really intensive monitoring. So once we find a bird then we will try to find that bird every three to five days for the rest of the season. So it's, it's really intensive. Once we have a pair of birds, then we're doing that to find out where their nest is. If they have a nest how many eggs they have, how many nestlings they have, how many of those actually become fledglings. We'll be trying to trap the adults to band them with, with metal bands We, we can identify them. but yeah, it, it, it's A long field season just, when I when I was a, card and field biologist I was basically living in an Airstream trailer in a cattle pasture for five months. And it was amazing. Sometimes you actually be woken up because the cattle were scratching themselves against the side of the trailer. Yeah, it's just a really, a really wonderful way to spend a summer. You know, I mean, you can get a little stir crazy at some points and, you know, you want to perhaps have a shower or you want to be able to go to the bathroom or get to the fridge without putting your shoes on, which is something that you can do at the field site. But it really makes you appreciate those things in life.

Meredith 30:40

like a season and pretty long days if some of them are, especially for burning, right? Like, I feel like sunrise, usually there's like a cap after sunrise for a lot of birding surveys, but I guess if they're so visual and they're not so much you're, you're just going until you've surveyed the area. Is that what I'm getting?

Hazel Wheeler 31:05

Yeah. Yes. basically be going from shortly after sunrise to sunset ish times if you want to put in the full days, but you know, labor laws. So are caps on what people can do. But I mean, this is also in these areas, you know, it can get, it can get pretty hot. there isn't much cover, so, Shrikes do, when you get into days where it is around 30 degrees and you've got the humid X and it's just kind of, sweltering and punishing. Nobody wants to be out there, and actually strikes get pretty quiet as well, so there can be like a little siesta midday. So you know, you do your morning, and you have a little break, and then you go back out for kind evening time when it's not so hot. but yeah, it is, it is a long, it is a long field season for sure.

Meredith 31:57

from the field?

Hazel Wheeler 31:58

To pick just one, but, I have some stories around this one nest that they seemed to be doing really well. We were doing some monitoring, and then there was a nest failure. This was a site that we did have access to so we could actually go up and we have don't approach bird nests, but we have, you know, general public don't approach bird nests, but we have all the permits, you know, we're allowed to approach and investigate what happened. And it looked like maybe, some sort of mammal had gotten in like the nest was kind of torn up. But when this happens. If it's early enough in the season, the birds will likely re nest nearby. We spent a lot of time just watching this site

Meredith 32:37

go

Hazel Wheeler 32:39

were going and

Meredith 32:41

recording.

Hazel Wheeler 32:42

us much. Like I'd see one here and then another one over there and they just kind of disappear. And I just couldn't figure out where their nest was for the longest time, until this one day that I was watching and then one of the adults popped up and then a juvenile sparrow popped up and then suddenly there was a chase. So I watched this shrike chase down a juvenile sparrow and they collided in midair and they went down into the grass. And then I saw the shrike come up, and then it went down again, and then I saw the shrike come up, and then it went down again, and then the third time it came up, and it had the sparrow in its mouth, and then it flew off to the new nest tree that I was finally able to locate where it was feeding this, this juvenile sparrow that it just killed to its babies. So, so that was a pretty amazing day. It was one of those, like, Just on nature moments in the field.

Meredith 33:39

LOoking Geographic

Hazel Wheeler 33:45

yeah, it was, it was amazing. This was also, this was also a site where I had been watching, an earlier day, I had been watching this, this site for so long. I was standing along this fence row, standing so still for so long that I actually became the field and a sparrow landed on my head. So that was also, that wasn't Shrike related. I mean, it was, I was looking for Shrikes, but that was, I think that was my best moment ever as a field biologist. had become the field. Yeah. It was amazing.

Meredith 34:22

very would be pretty what I understand, grassland birds are Like notoriously good at hiding where their nests like throwing birds off their sites. So good for you for, for finding them. That sounds like a lot of work.

Hazel Wheeler 34:41

shrikes are a little bit more obvious because they're not nesting on the ground. They're gonna be nesting in like, in Cardinal they'll be nesting in hawthorns. in Napanee in eastern cedars. So, so, if you watch them, there's kind of a distinctive, you know, they'll, they'll be flying low along the ground and then there's a swoop up into the middle of the tree. So that's kind of their distinctive. If you catch that, then it's like, okay. There's the nest tree.

Meredith 35:12

So we've talked a lot about loggerhead shrikes. I'm like, how did you start working with them?

Hazel Wheeler 35:21

I did an undergraduate degree in wildlife biology

Meredith 35:24

s

Hazel Wheeler 35:26

pretty interested in, conservation But I actually came out of my undergrad thinking that I was going to work on small mammals. I was, I was really interested in this population of southern flying squirrels down in Hamilton. but that didn't pan out. No small mammals, but my love and interest of Conservation stayed strong. So, you know, it was just kind of, it was like one thing led to another. So, you know, I got out of my undergrad, I needed some experience. So I volunteered at a bird banding lab up in Thunder Bay. So I got some bird experience. And then from that, I able to get like my first paying field job working I was a field tech for a master's student studying grassland birds out in Grasslands National Park And yeah, after that, I was able to get a job for a little bit at Birds Canada, and I helped out with Ontario Swift Watch when it was just being developed. But it was always kind of focusing on species at risk. It just felt really important. You know, there's, there's, A lot of great science that is done out there that increases our knowledge of just species generally, but it's just always felt really important to me to be focusing on species of in conservation need. So. I actually did a master's studying chimney swifts and other species at risk another great species and fantastic because it's like many people don't realize that there are species at risk that live right in our urban areas, maybe in your own house. So I thought that was a really, really great species for kind of public outreach and getting people engaged. But yeah, I don't know, I got a field job with the with the loggerhead trike team in 2013 and Wildlife Preservation Canada just hasn't been able to get rid of me since.

Meredith 37:13

I and maybe you end up you expected, but it just fits. And, That's, that's very cool. And I totally forgot to ask you earlier to like, If people want to help, like, what can people do to help the recovery of the loggerhead shrike? Is it, you know, you were talking about people need to be more aware of these species. Is it talk about it? Is it report sightings? Like, what, what can people do to help?

Hazel Wheeler 37:43

yeah, so, I mean, talking about sharing, if you are excited or passionate about this kind of thing, share that with other people, it as well. If you ever see a Shrike especially one that has color bands, we absolutely want to hear about it, so birders out there Let us know and we will be forever grateful. We do have a volunteer program with the loggerhead trike recovery program, called, it's called adopt a site. So, you basically adopt sites for for the spring and early summer. We'll assign you some sites to go out and look for loggerhead trike and a suite of other grassland birds. And this is that, that piece of like, expanding our reach beyond just where our teams can focus. Yeah, I mean, also we are a nonprofit charity. So, if you don't have time to share, but maybe you have a little bit of extra money, no, we'll, we'll make very good use of your funds and a lot, a lot of the donations that we get, like that money goes right into the this kind of work.

Meredith 38:52

support this organization. And yeah, I think last question before we wrap it up, do you have a favorite thing about them?

Hazel Wheeler 39:01

It's like, how do I pick just one? I mean, one thing that I just absolutely love about them is how angry they look all the time. They are pissed off at you and everything else. And, and I just, I just love that about them. They're, angry little birds. But another thing that The juveniles, so this, this impaling behavior it's, it's an innate behavior. So it's, it's in them from hatching. They don't necessarily need to be taught, but they do need to practice. So if you are ever lucky enough to find shrikes, if you watch them for a little bit, you might be able to see them practice. They're impaling with like leaves or little strips of bark or whatever else they might find around and it is the cutest thing you will ever see. So, pretty hard to beat.

Meredith 40:05

impaling with a awesome. Oh, well, Hazel, I can't wait to take you up on your offer to come hang out in Carden with you or wherever we might hang out. Yep. Looking forward to it, but thank you so much for taking the time to conversation and I love the loggerhead trike even more now.

Hazel Wheeler 40:26

That's all I want.

40:29

And that's a wrap on our very first episode of Rarefied. We hope you've enjoyed getting to know the fascinating loggerhead shrike, its striking looks, surprising hunting habits, and the incredible work being done to protect it. A huge thank you to our guest Hazel Wheeler for sharing their experience and stories from the field. If you're inspired by their work, please consider supporting Wildlife Preservation Canada and the other organizations out there that are helping species like the Shrike fight for survival. If you loved this episode, please subscribe and leave us a review. It helps Rarefied reach more people who care about our planet's rarest creatures. And don't forget to follow us on Instagram at rarefied. pod and sign up for the newsletter on our website for updates, behind the scenes contents, and sneak peeks at upcoming episodes. Next time we'll be sticking around the grasslands, but we're going to be looking at a unique, cryptic, some might say, plain butterfly, but trust me, they're more interesting than they appear. You won't want to miss it. Okay. Until then, get out there and explore the wild because every species has a story and every one of us can make a difference. Thanks for listening. And until next time, happy trails.