Joe McWilliams

Lakeside Leader

It’s not every day somebody from another country ventures into northern Alberta to listen to bird songs. But that’s what was happening last week and the week before in Lesser Slave Lake Provincial Park. Cornell University student Hannah Pryor is researching something to do with the calls (or songs) of a couple of sub-species of the yellow-rumped warbler, and because the Lesser Slave Lake Bird Observatory (LSLBO) has a certain reputation, she chose it as one of four locations for her study.

It was a good choice. The myrtle warbler sub-species isn’t just here, it’s the most-banded, most observed of all the warblers in the 30 years of LSLBO operations. Its more western counterpart is the Audubon’s warbler. What Pryor is trying to find out is “whether the eastern and western sub-species recognize each other’s songs.”

So she’s been out playing Audubon’s songs for the myrtles, and recording their response. She’s done similar work so far at locations in Washington State and in California.

Pryor has the idea that being close to the ‘transition’ or ‘hybrid zone’ (between sub-species), the myrtles of this area might respond more readily to the Audubon’s songs.

This is perhaps not everyone’s cup of tea, but Pryor appears to be loving every minute of it. Growing up in north-central Ohio, she says she got to know and love the warblers, which pass through there. Some might even spend their winters in the area, because, although they are insect-eaters, they’ve evolved the ability to digest certain berries, including myrtle berries. This allows them to survive winters without insects.

The relation between the sub-species of yellow-rumped warblers is ‘under-researched,’ Pryor says. There have been some studies, but “not on a large scale,” so when she found a gap in the research, she pitched it to her academic advisor, and he gave her the thumbs’ up. Her project is her undergraduate honours thesis, she says.

Accompanying Hannah on her big western and northern adventure is her dad, Josh Pryor. Cornell would not allow Hannah to drive outside the U.S. (likely for insurance reasons), so Josh – being able to do his comms tech work remotely from anywhere with an internet connection – stepped up and offered to chauffeur her across the continent. They first went to a park up among the pines in Washington State, and then headed north to the Lesser Slave Lake area.

By now the pair are probably on their way back to Ohio.

It’s been a good experience, Hannah says. Lots of birds, for one thing; for another, good support from the Boreal Centre and LSLBO staff, with accommodations in a staff trailer at the provincial park campground.

“It’s a really beautiful place,” Hanna says. “This whole place is really cool.”

One big difference is that warbler habitat is everywhere. In other places she’s studied, she had to climb mountains to get into the right zone, and set up camp.