Land Animals

Song Sparrow

Song sparrows weigh up to 12-53g. Song sparrows have rounded, long tails and they are 5-7 in long. Another name for a song sparrow is Gorrion cantor and Bruant [Pinson] chanteur. Song sparrows have both prey and predators. Song sparrows are omnivores. The Song Sparrow consumes insects and seeds. Song sparrows forage on the floor and in shallow water. The predators of song sparrows are cats, hawks, and owls.A female song sparrow lay up to 3-5 eggs in a nest. One way to find a Song Sparrow egg is because the egg’s color is bluish green with brown spots.That is amazing because eggs are normally white.Song sparrows sing to attract mates. That is one reason they are called a Song Sparrow. That’s a cool fact!

Photo from: Wikipedia

Sources:http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/BirdGuide/Song_Sparrow_dtl.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_Sparrow

Photo from: Wikipedia

Island Fox

The island fox is found on San Clemente, Santa Catalina, San Nicolas, Santa Cruz, San Miguel and Santa Rosa.

Appearance:

The island fox is smaller than a house cat and only weighs 5 lb. It is 18-20 inches long. The male island fox is larger than a female island fox. The island Fox has gray fur on its head, and white fur on its belly.

Diet:

The island foxes are omnivores but, they only eats fruit, the rest of what it eats are meat. The island fox only hunt by themselves not in packs. The island fox consume insects, fruits, eggs, They are Great teachers in their feeding habits, primarily taking insects (grasshoppers, crickets, and beetles) and land snails, but also feeding on rodents, birds (chicks and eggs), reptiles, fruits, prickly pear, Catalina cherry, and other plants. This species has evolved as the top carnivore in their environment and has no natural predators.

Island Fox

Reproduction:

Island foxes are seen with a female in January. They start breeding in the late February to the early March. The female island fox can only give birth to 2-3 kits in a den.

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Mammalia

Order: Carnivora

Family: Canidae

Genus: Urocyon

Species: U. littoralis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_fox

://www.santabarbarazoo.org/showAnimals.asp?id=139

Brown Pelican

Characteristics

The brown pelican is about four feet in size. It has a brown and gray body and a white head with a brown crown. Its neck is dark brown. Young pelicans are all brown. The brown pelican has a very long gray bill with a large pouch of skin. Its pouch holds two or three times more than the it’s stomach can hold, close to three gallons of fish and water! Males and females look the same.

Range

The brown pelican can be found on the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf Coasts. On the Atlantic Coast, it can be found from North Carolina south to Venezuela. On the Pacific Coast, its range stretches from Southern California.

Diet

The brown pelican is a great diver. It drops from the air with its wings partly folded and dives into the water to catch its prey. It is the only species of pelican that does this! It uses its bill and pouch like a net. It scoops up fish and water. It strains out the water from the side of its bill, tips back its head and swallows the fish it caught. It doesn't carry fish in its pouch; it only uses the pouch to scoop up fish. Sometimes gulls will try to steal fish from the pelican's pouch. In fact, they will even perch on the pelican's head and wait for just the right moment to grab a fish! The brown pelican eats menhaden. Herring, mullet, sheep head, silversides, crustaceans, and other fish.

Life Cycle

The male brown pelican selects a nesting site and then tries to attract a female with a display behavior of head movements. Once a female selects a male, the male will bring her sticks, reeds and grass for the nest. The female accepts the materials with a sway of her head and then weaves them into the nest. It can take over a week to build the nest. The nest can be built on the ground, in a tree or in a bush the pelican will put its webbed feet over the eggs to keep them warm. The chicks hatch after about a month. For the first 10 days after hatching, the parents will leave regurgitated food on the bottom of the nest for the chicks to eat. After that the chicks will eat regurgitated food directly from their parents' bill.

Photo from: Wikipedia

Golden Eagle

The Golden Eagle is a very important part of San Miguel Island. It has also has done some very harmful things to Island. The Golden Eagle is not anywhere close to extinct and that is a great thing for the Island.

Diet

Golden Eagles is a Carnivore. Since it only eats meat it

only has a very small variety. On this Island the Golden Eagle

will eat the Island Fox, squirrels, Lamb, mice and

whatever it can find. When a Golden Eagle can’t find food

on the Island it flies over to the mainland to find some food.

When a Golden Eagle is well grown it is hunted by anything

on the Island. The use there Talons to kill their

prey and there Talons are very sharp so it can rip right

through all the skin on their enemies. Being a Carnivore on San Miguel Island has its pro’s and con’s.

Habitat

Golden Eagles can live from anywhere from the west coast

all the way to central Asia and the east coast of Asia.

The reason is, is because they have wings and

they can fly to anywhere in the world that they want.

When they were living on the coast they just decided to fly over to the

Channel Islands. When I say that they were a pest I mean that when

they went over to the Island they killed Island Foxes which were use

to not having any predators now have something to look out for.

Appearance

A Golden Eagle isn’t all gold but because its head is gold so it can proudly stand for his name. A Golden Eagle is bigger than a Bald Eagle but they don’t look the same. Golden Eagles are 1 feet long and 3 feet in height and they also have a wing span of about 7 feet.

Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_eagle

Photo from: Wikipedia