wintering loons

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History is afoot on Muskellunge Lake. A two-year-old male is making a play for a high-quality territory….which is pretty shocking. 

Let me put this into perspective. Only about a quarter of all two-year-old loons even bother to return to the nesting grounds. The vast majority of all loons of this young age from eastern and midwestern breeding populations are cooling their heels in the Atlantic right now. Some are off of the Carolinas; some New Brunswick. The bulk of all two-year-olds play the long game: they retain the drab grey-brown winter plumage throughout their first two years, stay healthy on a saltwater diet, and postpone any thought of breeding until they acquire sufficient body mass to compete for a territory in their fourth or fifth year.

We have never observed a two-year-old adult male or female settle on a territory. Indeed, we have only once observed a loon as young as three claim a territory — and that was very late in the season and in a vacant space without competitors. (His mate, sad to say, was his mother.)

As territorial intruders, two- and three-year-old adults are nervous Nellies. They sit low in the water while circling with territorial pairs and are deathly afraid of underwater attack. They peer (look under water) and panic dive obsessively. When anxiety overwhelms them, they freak out and flee across the water tremoloing. In short, two- and three-year-olds do not appear emotionally equipped for territory ownership.

But “Junior”– as Linda calls the two-year-old that has settled on Muskellunge — threw out the book on reproductive maturation. When the 12-year-old male that took over on Muskellunge this year became injured in early June after a failed nesting attempt, Junior took possession of the lake and began defending it vociferously with territorial yodels (as you can see in Linda’s photo, above).

For a time, it seemed that Junior would ease into lake ownership without a battle. Yet news that Muskellunge Lake was up for grabs spread fast in the neighborhood, and the last two weeks have seen multiple local males vie for control. One of these males, from nearby Deer Lake, has tried to claim Muskellunge before and is renewing his bid. A second male, this a ten-year-old reared on neighboring Clear Lake, seemed settled on Harrison Flowage last year but is apparently looking to upgrade. 

Junior’s age is not all that makes his story unusual. He is also the only young adult (out of 211 observed so far) that we have ever observed to compete for ownership of his own natal territory. In this he is fortunate; the current breeding female on the lake, who will probably pair with the victorious male, is not Junior’s mother, but instead a female that took possession of Muskellunge last year.

According to Linda’s reports, Muskellunge remains in an uproar. One day Junior is in control and paired with the resident female (or the Bridge Lake female, whose mate did not return this spring). The next day the Deer male has taken ownership and patrols the lake, searching for Junior, who evades him. 

Linda and I are trying to celebrate the oddity of a two-year-old territory owner and not overthink it. But it is difficult to sit back and pretend to be neutral. After all, Junior got his name because he is the son of Clune, the beloved male who settled on Muskellunge in 2009, cranked out 14 chicks during 14 years of territory ownership, and never uttered a discouraging word for canoe nor kayak.

And it is hard not to wonder how a loon as young as Junior even got a shot at such a good territory. Is his territorial gambit an anomaly — a one-time peculiarity that you are bound to observe once if you study a loon population for 31 years? Or must we interpret his premature, longshot bid for territory ownership as yet another indication of the depleted ranks of young nonterritorial loons that epitomize population decline in the region?

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Loons are always with me. With its fires, mudslides, and Mediterranean climate, southern California could hardly be more different from northern Wisconsin, but the loons winter here. I see them at Newport Pier, a bustling wharf that juts out into the Pacific and draws scads of Vietnamese anglers…..and me. The chattering fishermen are after pacific mackerel, which feed beneath the wharf in great whirling clouds. I am looking for pelagic birds that might fly by, like red-footed boobies, pomarine jaegers, and common murres. But I always see loons too. In fact, common, pacific, and red-throated loons all occur along the coast of southern California in good numbers.

My first sighting this morning was auspicious; I spotted a fast-flying parasitic jaeger as I reached the end of the pier. Small pods of common dolphins surfaced at intervals as they too pursued mackerel, exciting the gulls and pelicans near them. Great rafts of western and Clark’s grebes stretched out north and south of the pier. Experience told me that these circumstances were likely to produce a rare bird sighting.

As I completed my initial scan of the water adjacent to the pier, I saw a common loon with a buoy near it — at least, the odd dayglow-pink item near the loon registered as a buoy on my first glance at it through my spotting scope. (A photo taken with my phone through the scope appears above.) As I studied the loon and pink item further, I realized it was a bobber connected to one of the legs, because it followed along a foot behind and bobbed up and down rhythmically as the bird swam slowly along the surface. I groaned. Even in winter, apparently, loons face fishing entanglements.

My relaxing birding trip at an end, I watched the loon for an hour to learn how it was coping with the fishing gear. Fortunately, it swam southward during this period, which, bit by bit,  brought it closer to the pier. Despite the cheerful fishermen whose casts and puttering about blocked my view at intervals, the loon was simple to track. Early on, another common loon approached and preened within a few meters. The entangled loon remained alert but showed no other obvious response. Similarly, it ignored a smaller pacific loon that came near while diving. A second common loon came over and showed a hint of social behavior, such as we see in the breeding season. For a third time, the loon with the bobber made no response. The bird did not even react noticeably when a juvenile western gull flew over, settled beside it, and began to pick at the bobber. At all times, the entangled loon sat high in the water; it never dove, preened, or even gave a wing flap.

The lack of social interaction, disinclination to dive or exhibit other normal loon behaviors, and posture of the loon in the water speak volumes about its condition. These signs indicate that it has probably been dragging the unwanted bobber for some days and is severely impacted. Fortunately, bald eagles, the loons’ nemesis during summer, are rare in southern California, so the loon is not likely to succumb to predation. But its inability to dive means it has already begun to lose weight and become weak. It will surely starve if the bobber is not detached soon. I will visit the pier tomorrow to see if I can relocate the bird. If so, and if its status appears unchanged, I will see if I can put together a capture team. With great luck, we might free the doomed bird.