Kedrovka
KEDROVKA-and; pl. genus. wok, dates-vkam; and. Forest bird of the passerine order, dark brown with white spots, feeding on seeds coniferous trees, mostly cedar; nutcracker.
nutcracker(nutlet), a bird of the crow family. Length about 35 cm. It lives mainly in the coniferous forests of Eurasia. It feeds on pine nuts and seeds of other tree species, insects. Promotes the resettlement of cedar pine.
KEDROVKAKEDROVKA (nut, Nucifraga caryocatactes), a bird of the crow family (cm. corvidae) slightly smaller than a jackdaw (length about 35 cm; body weight 125-190 g), with a thin and long beak. The nutcracker is colored dark brownish-brown with white streaks, which are absent on the upper side of the head. The undertail is white, with a light border at the end of the tail.
Distributed in the forests of the taiga type of Europe and Asia from Scandinavia and the Alps to Kamchatka, the Kuril Islands, Primorye, Japan and China. Prefers spruce, cedar and cedar-dwarf forests. Nutcracker is a typical forest bird, it deftly jumps along the branches, hangs on the cones of coniferous trees. In ordinary years, he leads a sedentary lifestyle, making only small migrations. In some years, it undertakes mass migrations outside the nesting area.
The main food of the nutcracker is the seeds of the cedar pine, spruce and insects. She also eats the seeds of various other plants, chicks and eggs. small birds, lizards, frogs. Nutcracker starts breeding early: in the European part of Russia, it begins to build nests in the first half of March. By this time, she climbs into remote areas of the forest, where she leads a secretive lifestyle throughout the entire nesting period. Nests are built on coniferous trees at a height of 4-6 m. In clutch there are from 2 to 5 eggs of light bluish or fawn color with brown mottling. Egg sizes are 33.9 by 24.9 mm. The female incubates, starting with the first egg, for 16-18 days. The chicks leave the nest at the age of 21-25 days. Broods with well-flying chicks are found at different dates in June.
An interesting biological feature of Nutcrackers is mass migration caused by fodder crop failure. In years with a good harvest of seeds of coniferous trees, seasonal migrations of nutcrackers are small and have a local character. With a poor harvest of pine nuts in some places, the birds move to others where there is a harvest. In years when the crop failure of pine nuts coincides with the crop failure of spruce seeds and covers vast territories, the nutcracker makes long flights outside the nesting area. This is especially characteristic of the Siberian nutcrackers.
Another feature of this bird is also remarkable - the preparation of feed for the winter. She arranges pantries of pine nuts on the ground - under moss, lichens, in stone placers, under bark and in hollows of trees. When preparing food, the Nutcracker collects nuts in a throat bag. Up to 120 cedar nuts were found in it. Birds remember the places of their pantries and find them in winter, dig them out, making passages up to 60 cm in the snow. Part of the nutcracker reserves are not used, the seeds germinate in them. Thus, the walnut tree plays a large role in the resettlement of the cedar pine. The renewal of the cedar pine on the burned areas occurs exclusively with the help of this bird. It is also useful in the extermination of insects harmful to the forest.
encyclopedic Dictionary. 2009 .
Synonyms:See what "nutcracker" is in other dictionaries:
Kedrovka- Kedrovka. KEDROVKA (walnut), taiga bird (crow family). The length is about 35 cm. It lives in Eurasia, mainly in spruce forests and cedar forests. The main food is pine nuts, which are stored for the winter. The nutcracker does not find a part of its pantries ... Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary
Kedrovka- Nucifraga caryocatactes see also 18.12.3. Genus Nucifraga Nucifraga Nucifraga caryocatactes Bird slightly larger than a dove, brown (rarely almost black) with frequent white streaks; the top of the head, wings and tail are black; end of tail... Birds of Russia. Directory
Orekhovka Dictionary of Russian synonyms. nutcracker n., number of synonyms: 2 walnut (3) bird ... Synonym dictionary
- (nutlet) a bird of the crow family. Length approx. 35 cm. Lives mainly in the coniferous forests of Eurasia. It feeds on pine nuts and seeds of other tree species, insects. Promotes the resettlement of cedar pine ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary
KEDROVKA, and, wives. Forest bird crows. Dictionary Ozhegov. S.I. Ozhegov, N.Yu. Shvedova. 1949 1992 ... Explanatory dictionary of Ozhegov
Hazelnut (Nucifraga caryocatactes), a bird of the family. crows. Length an average of 35 cm. Distributed in Eurasia, in the USSR from South. Karelia and Belarus to Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands, an isolated area in the spruce forests of the Tien Shan. It lives in mixed and coniferous ... ... Biological encyclopedic dictionary
A bird from the genus of crows, a walnut. Dictionary of foreign words included in the Russian language. Chudinov A.N., 1910 ... Dictionary of foreign words of the Russian language
This term has other meanings, see Kedrovka (meanings). "Orekhovka" redirects here; see also other meanings. ? Kedrovka ... Wikipedia
I Nutcracker Nucifraga caryocatactes, a bird of the corvid family of the passerine order. The body length is about 35 cm. The plumage is dark brown with white streaks. Distributed in coniferous forests of Europe and Asia; in the USSR in the taiga zone and the Tien forests ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia
- (nutlet), a bird of this. crows. Length OK. 35 cm. Lives Ch. arr. in the coniferous forests of Eurasia. Feeds on pine nuts and seeds of other tree species, insects. Promotes the resettlement of cedar pine. Kedrovka … Natural science. encyclopedic Dictionary
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Charming and noisy bird nutcracker is known to almost all people living near vast taiga forests. This bird is also known as the walnut. This small bird received such a name because of the specifics of its diet, the main diet of which is pine nuts.
Due to the wide distribution of nutcrackers and their loudness, quite often these birds are shot. For this reason, one can hear the question from amateur hunters: is it possible to eat a nutcracker bird?
Kedrovka - chief arborist
A small nut bird belongs to the corvidae family and, like all crows, has an average body size, a small body weight from 125 g to 200 g, and a massive beak. Birds settle in areas where cedar trees are common. Most often you can see them in the Russian taiga and in the mountains of Europe.
Nutcrackers live in noisy flocks. Noisy birds fly from cedar to cedar, constantly calling to one another and twirling their tails in front of each other.
A feature of the nut is the presence of a storage sac in its body. When collecting nuts, the bird does not hammer them, but puts them entirely in the compartment under the tongue. Thus, in one raid, a nutcracker can collect up to 100 nuts.
After collecting the required amount of nuts, the nutcracker flies away from the processed tree at a distance of 2 km to 4 km and hides its reserves. During the summer period, she organizes more than 50 thousand caches.
Nuts often forget where they hid their supplies, and thanks to them, not only birds, but also chipmunks, sables, and bears feed in the winter. Nuts not found by forest dwellers swell and germinate in spring. Thus, forgetful birds increase the number of cedars and restore the forest.
On the this moment due to climate change, nuts are found even in the suburbs. Noisy birds settle in parks in winter, looking for nuts and berries.
Edible or not edible?
Due to the appearance of a large number of nutcrackers in villages and cities, hunters began to shoot these restless birds, and many were interested in the question of whether it is possible to eat a nutcracker bird? The answer is quite simple - you can.
A fairly clean bird mainly feeds on pine nuts, acorns, pine and spruce seeds. During the hungry period, the walnut can also eat berries, insects and small vertebrates.
According to hunters, the nutcracker is quite edible. Poultry meat is dark and rather tough. The significant difference between meat is that it smells of nut and pine needles. When cooking, it seems that the bird is cooked in a nut sauce.
Kedrovka- this is an amazing representative of the corvid family, a small bird, inferior in size to a jackdaw, its weight is on average 150 g. But its vital activity is so unique that it greatly contributes to the growth and spread of cedar and walnut trees. Therefore, its contribution to the ecosystem is truly enormous.
The body of this winged creature has a length of about 30 cm. The main background of the feather is dark brown-brown, dotted with numerous white streaks. The back of the head of such a bird and the back of the wings are black, as is the tail with a white border, having a length of about 11 cm.
The female can be distinguished from the male by a fuzzy pattern of white blotches and a lighter, even dull color of the feather, due to which it visually merges almost completely with the surrounding space.
It is quite difficult to distinguish a female from a male nutcracker, the mottled plumage on the female's chest slightly merges
Such winged creatures, as a rule, make a lot of noise in nature. But nutcracker's voice sounds different depending on the circumstances, her mood and even the season. In case of danger, it makes crackling loud sounds similar to "kerr-kerr".
Often the singing of these little creatures is perceived as very harmonious and resembles the short rumbling trills of a nightjar, sometimes it is heard with something like “kip”, “kev” and “tyuu”. In winter, the concerts of these birds are distinguished by the tenderness of whistling, as well as a set of squealing, crackling, clicking rhythmic sounds.
The range of these birds is very extensive. In Eurasia, they inhabit taiga forests and are distributed from Scandinavia to the eastern borders of the mainland, while they also live on the Kuril and Japanese islands.
Kinds
The genus called: nutcrackers, does not include so many, only two species. The first of them, living on the territory of Eurasia, has already been described above. And the features of the appearance of birds are clearly visible on the photo of nutcrackers.
Name of the second: North American walnut. There are such birds in the Cordeliers. They are about the same size as the relatives from the previous variety, but may be slightly smaller. At the same time, their plumage color is noticeably different. Its main background is gray-ash, and the back of the wings is black with white areas.
Birds have dark legs and beaks. Members of the feathered kingdom live in pine forests. Representatives of both varieties from the genus Nutcrackers are not threatened with extinction, their numbers are relatively considered stable, and the population is quite numerous.
Kuksha - bird, cedar-like. She is also a taiga inhabitant and also belongs to the corvid family. These birds are approximately the same in size and proportions of the body. But the coloring of the feather of the kuksha is noticeably different from the feather attire of the nutcracker.
It has a brown-gray color, a dark crown and wings, as well as a red tail, makes deaf, reminiscent of "kuuk" sounds, for which it was nicknamed the kuksha. And both birdies are sometimes confused with, by the way, a representative of the same family and order of passerines, which includes both varieties of birds from the genus of nutcrackers.
North American Nutcracker, the second species of the Nutcracker bird
Lifestyle and habitat
The native home of the nutcracker is, consonant with its name, cedar, but also spruce and other coniferous forests. This bird is not particularly attracted to water spaces, and it does not even try to overcome rivers more than 3 km wide. But sometimes it happens that with storms and typhoons such creatures are brought to remote islands, where they take root and remain as permanent inhabitants.
Other journeys, especially long ones, are not particularly possible for such a winged creature, especially if this is not necessary. Is not migrant . Kedrovka leads a sedentary lifestyle. And in order to survive in the cold, he makes very extensive stocks of seeds and nuts for the winter - his favorite food.
And only in years when crop failures occur for various reasons in the Siberian forests, extensive fires occur there or trees suffer from predatory felling, such birdies from there in large numbers go to the west to find additional sources of food.
During such periods, whole flocks of migrated birds catch the eye of people in Central and Eastern Europe. There and nutcracker lives before better times come. By the way, in the old days in these parts, numerous groups of these birds, appearing from nowhere, were considered a harbinger of great misfortune.
Superstitious European inhabitants of past centuries, unable to find the correct interpretation of the invasion of flocks of nutcrackers, associated them with famine, wars and plague.
Such a small bird has enough enemies in nature, of course. Small predators can be of particular danger to her during the nesting period: wild cats, foxes, martens,. Taking advantage of the helplessness of such birds, who are entirely busy with the troubles of breeding and raising offspring, they attack them, and also feast on their eggs and cubs.
Such encroachments are often successful because nutcrackers are by nature very slow, not always dexterous, they are heavy to lift and rise into the air rather slowly.
Birds are also vulnerable during periods when they make abundant supplies for the winter. At such a time, they have a habit of completely losing their vigilance, they don’t hear or see anything around them, and therefore they become unusually easy victims of their clever and cunning enemies.
Food
The diet of the nutcracker is very diverse. Such birds can eat seeds, beech nuts, berries, fruits and acorns. Even larger living creatures containing a sufficient amount of protein also serve as food for them.
Having a thin beak, the nutcracker easily extracts nuts from cones
But still, most of all, the body of these birds needs carbohydrates, because it is they that provide it in any cold weather, which often occurs in winter in taiga forests, with so much energy needed during these periods. Therefore, the main food of these winged creatures is still pine nuts, which contain these elements in large quantities.
Bird nuts have adapted to be mined from cones. Such a case for nutcrackers is not particularly difficult. After all, nature itself provided such a small bird with a beak, very adapted to this kind of activity, long and thin in shape.
It is with them that the nutcracker peels the cones, and when it takes out the nuts, it breaks them against stones or trees, making them suitable for their own use.
But with protein food, that is, insects, Nutcrackers most often feed their chicks, because the rapidly growing organisms of young animals need precisely this kind of feed. Pine nuts, these amazing creatures, begin to be harvested as they ripen. Birds usually do this together, grouping into flocks, such communities and going in search of food.
Gathering supplies, nutcrackers are inventive and tireless, and as a reward in the snow, frosty winters is the abundance of food for themselves and their offspring. Working tirelessly during the warm season, only one nutcracker is able to harvest about seventy thousand nuts. She carries them in a special sublingual pouch.
In such a natural adaptation, inherited from birth and located under the beak, up to a hundred nuts can be carried a considerable distance at a time. But in the stomach of these little birds, no more than twelve of them fit. The rest remain in reserve.
Next, the nuts are hidden in a pre-prepared pantry. It can be a hollow in a tree or a depression in the ground, located from the cedar from which the crop was harvested, at a distance of up to four kilometers. Such birds tend to make more caches. And usually the birds remember their location well and do not forget.
Although there is an opinion that nutcrackers discover their secret places by smell. However, during periods of heavy snowfalls, this is hardly possible, and therefore this version cannot be considered consistent.
But incidents with pantries sometimes happen, such stores with delicious nutritious treats may well be discovered by other living creatures: field mice, which, of course, will not deny themselves the pleasure of getting enough due to the frugality of other living creatures. And the real owners of stocks - small hardworking birds are left without a well-deserved reward.
That is why the nutcrackers try to make more hiding places. And if they notice that unwanted observers appear at the time of hiding delicious treasures, they try to strengthen the camouflage measures.
Large warehouses of pine nuts, buried in the ground, are not always useful to the birds who made them, which greatly contributes to the spread of cedar seeds, moved by tireless winged creatures in this way over considerable distances.
And from them then wonderful trees grow in large numbers. That is why in Tomsk in 2013 people built a real monument to this feathered worker. After all, the nutcracker, in fact, cares about the revival of nature much more than a person, although, of course, it is not capable of realizing its grandiose destiny.
Pictured is a monument to nutcracker in Tomsk
It should be noted that in many regions of the European west, where such birds are also found, there are no cedar trees, but there are walnut trees, and it is they that serve as the main source of food for these creatures there. That's why they call nutcracker, for example, in the territory.
Reproduction and lifespan
These, already cautious birds, become even more shy during the mating season, they try not to leave their nesting territories and hide from prying eyes. It is precisely the fact that such creatures make significant reserves of food for the winter that allows them in the spring to very soon start breeding and growing a new generation of nutcrackers.
They place nests on coniferous trees, placing them at a considerable height, and build them from the most common building material: lichen, moss, grass and of course twigs. Their nutcrackers are simply randomly piled up and held together with clay.
Nutcracker nest with chicks
Birds begin to make these preparations even before the temperature of the surrounding space rises above zero. Already in March, in some cases - in April, the mother nutcracker lays up to four greenish and oblong eggs, in which the father of the family always helps her in incubation.
Kedrovka – bird in relations with the opposite sex, it is constant, that is, monogamous, because pairs of such birds do not break up throughout their lives. Members of the family union carry out incubation in turn, and while one guards the eggs, the other flies to last year's food supplies.
At first, small nutcrackers are also fed on seeds softened in the parent crop, but when it gets quite warm and insects appear, the chicks switch to this type of food. Three weeks old, the young are already striving to test themselves in flights, and in June the new generation is gradually getting used to independence.
True, for a long time (somewhere before the end of the season), young members of the family are under parental supervision. Such small birds live relatively long. If accidents do not shorten the period measured by nature, they are able to live up to ten years, or even longer.
The nutcracker bird is a tireless fighter for the distribution of the Siberian cedar. What does a nutcracker bird look like? These winged creatures are smaller in size, are relatives and belong to the passerine family.
Birds cannot boast of size and size. The length of these birds is 30 cm, the weight is estimated at only 190 grams, and in some cases it is even less. Nutcrackers have a dark brown color, and their plumage is completely covered with white spots.
The birds are the owners of a fairly large tail, 11 cm in size, bordered by a white stripe. The long, thin beak and legs of these winged creatures are painted black.
Description of the nutcracker bird would not be complete without some addition. By outward signs male birds are somewhat different from females, which are smaller and lighter in size, and the white spots of their plumage are not as clear as those of their cavaliers.
These are inhabitants of the taiga forests, and are found on a vast territory from Scandinavia to Kamchatka, spreading further to the Kuril Islands and the coast of Japan.
The closest relatives of the nutcracker are the feathered inhabitants of the North American continent. These miniature creatures are very small in size, reaching a length of only 25 cm.
The nature and lifestyle of the nutcracker
Unpretentious Nutcrackers are not afraid of forty-degree frosts, and are quite capable of enduring much more severe cold. Thanks to this natural feature, birds do not fly away for the winter in search of warmth, as many of their feathered relatives do, but remain in their homeland, where everything they need is located in the cold season.
Nutcrackers are wintering birds that can withstand frost
However, they do undertake minor journeys in search of food, looking for new sources of food and more convenient habitats. In difficult times, with an acute shortage of food and fodder crop failure, Nutcrackers make mass migrations.
bird nutcracker has a cheerful, energetic and active character. And although birds often live alone, they are quite sociable and like to stray into small, but noisy, flocks.
Their whole existence passes in search of food, and finding it, barely satiated, the troublesome winged creatures rush to stock up for the future. It is with this feature of economic feathered creatures that many interesting facts.
Nutcracker is very thrifty, and thus benefits not itself, but the surrounding nature. How? This will be discussed further.
Feeding the Nutcracker
What do these birds eat? From the name of the birds, it is not at all difficult to guess about this. Nutcrackers simply love to feast on pine nuts, skillfully opening them with beak blows. In addition, they consume berries, beech seeds, hazel fruits and acorns as food.
Such winged creatures are known for their habit of stocking up for the winter. Nutcracker loves nuts very much, and when collecting them, she buries the excess in the ground, in reserve. And this property of birds greatly contributes to the cultivation and distribution of Siberian cedar.
Unlucky birds soon forget without a trace where and what they have, leaving the seeds of Siberian pine in fertile soil. And in place of the stockpile, after a while, powerful trees grow.
Such an ecological mission has not gone unnoticed by human civilization. And in memory of the heroic work of birds in one of the parks of the Siberian city of Tomsk, an impressive monument was erected to nutcracker, perpetuating its tireless work for the benefit of nature. Majestic Siberian cedars flaunt around such a peculiar monument, which is symbolic in itself.
Pictured is a monument to nutcracker in Tomsk
He not only buries his reserves in the ground, but also leaves them in the hollows of trees, and also hides them under the roofs of people's houses. Nature, for the benefit of which the birds work so hard, has provided the birds with everything necessary for this in abundance. The sublingual sac is an organ that the nutcracker has, which allows it to store up to a hundred pine nuts inside itself.
However, the birds are still not as frivolous as it might seem. Their lively intellect quite allows them, when collecting nuts, to discard the unsuitable, spoiled and rotten, and set aside only the best.
Nutcrackers have the ability to select only the best nuts
Mature individuals teach this art to young birds. Nutcrackers and animals do not disdain food, mercilessly exterminating small invertebrates. And in food stocks of nutcrackers left in people's homes, pieces of meat are often found.
Reproduction and lifespan
Nutcrackers are the kind that form married couples for life. They make nests for their chicks among the branches of coniferous trees, placing their buildings, which are fixed with clay, and are also lined with moss and feathers, very close to the ground. Such construction usually begins in early April.
The mother nutcracker not only lays, but also incubates eggs for two and a half weeks. And when offspring appear, parents diligently feed their pets, so loved by all nutcrackers, nuts, and small insects.
Pictured is a nutcracker's nest
After about three weeks, young chicks are already eager to fly, soon boldly soaring into the sky. But for a few more days they feel the care of their parents, who look after their cubs and feed them.
Despite their small size, birds live long enough, in some cases reaching the age of ten years or more.
Today we will talk about the most important arborist - the nutcracker bird. The photo, video that you will see in the article will help you understand and appreciate the role of this little bird in the life of a coniferous forest.
Kedrovka - a feathered arborist
There is a bird in the corvid family with an interesting name - the walnut. In another way, it is also called nutcracker.
The bird got its name due to the fact that it feeds mainly on pine nuts. Therefore, the nutcrackers live where the cedar forests grow. In the taiga expanses of the European and Asian parts of Russia, in the mountain forests of Europe, this noisy, noisy bird nests.
What does a nutcracker look like
Like all crows, it is of medium size. The body length can reach 36 cm, the tail - 11 cm, slightly rounded at the end and bordered by a light stripe. Body weight varies from 120 to 200 g.
The plumage is dense, the color is variegated. The back, head and abdomen are dark brown with scattered white spots here and there. The wings are dark, brown-brown, with shades of black. But the legs and beak are sharply distinguished by their black color.
Females can be distinguished from males by their lighter coloration. White spots on the body look blurry, not so sharply highlighted.
Features of breeding nutcracker
Nutcrackers try to build their nests in deaf and inaccessible places. Nest building begins in April. They carry in their beak small twigs and knots covered with lichen, moss, grass on high branches of coniferous trees. The female lays 3 to 7 eggs. Like the bird itself, the eggs are also variegated in color. On a white background with bluish or brownish tints, there are spots of brown olive or gray.
When the chicks grow up, the whole family flies away from these remote places. Nutcrackers are sedentary birds. But in autumn, they can move closer to human habitation or roam over fairly long distances in search of food.
Nutrition Features
Often in the forest you can see such a picture. Flocks of nutcrackers sit on the tops of cedars, twirl their tails in front of each other and call to each other. An amateur in their cry hears the crow "carr", but in general they make a crackling sound like "cray".
It is worth one of them to notice a bump in the crown of trees and fly to it, as the whole flock breaks off and also falls on a tree.
At the same time, they also make their own crackling sounds.
With the help of a long strong beak, the nutlet frees the cone from the shell, but the nuts themselves do not hammer. She swallows the whole nut whole and puts it in a kind of bag under the tongue. The bag in the goiter contains almost a hundred nuts. When it is full, it hangs down strongly, like a tightly stuffed purse.
It will go down lower, put its beak under an old, moss-covered dead tree and drop a few nuts.
He will see a hole under the snag - he will throw nuts there.
Flying past the hollow of any tree, and there will pour out part of his "purse". And so the bird flies through the taiga until it shakes and loses all the nuts.
Need to hide a nut in reserve .... In years when the harvest of nuts is large, the nutcracker can fly up to 10 km per day, hiding nuts in reserve for the winter. Her pantries are found in the hungry years and sable, and chipmunk, and.
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