Learning from Daxueshan: A Second Grader's Ecology Notes

Lead image/ Illustrated by Wu Zhexie
Caption/ The Taiwan Blue Magpie drawn by Zhexie. Taiwan Blue Magpies are active at low elevations; they are often seen in the hills behind our home in Neihu, in nearby school campuses, and in the forests of protected areas.

This summer vacation, we took Zhexie on a trip to Daxueshan, a famous international birdwatching destination. Along the way, birdwatchers with telephoto lenses were observing birds, and the variety and number of birds were very high; they could often be seen in the bushes and beside the mountain trails. The chubby Taiwan Laughingthrush in particular was not at all afraid of people and lingered around us. At night, the extremely thoughtful warden stationed at Daxueshan took a night lamp and suggested we could go look for the white-faced flying squirrel in the forest.

So a group of friends and we pulled the children along and walked cautiously along the forest trail. It was a quiet, slightly sacred night, with shining stars, and from time to time we heard the ji-ji calls of the white-faced flying squirrel in the distance, but we could not find its figure. Suddenly, in the woods above, a pair of bright eyes like stars appeared - it was the white-faced flying squirrel. We were so excited, and then watched its graceful form glide through the forest... So many creatures live in a world we do not notice, and yet we were fortunate enough to encounter them. That night, we felt immensely happy and fulfilled.

At night we went back to our room and watched the film provided by the Daxueshan management office, which told a terrifying story that happened to the Taiwan Blue Magpie, and it shocked us greatly. After returning, Zhexie wrote it in his summer vacation homework. The attached pictures are the Taiwan Blue Magpie and the Taiwan Laughingthrush drawn by Xiao Xi.

                                                     —-Zhexie's mother

Zhexie's diary:

Something terrible happened to the Taiwan Blue Magpie - it was contaminated by the Red-billed Blue Magpie. In recent years, someone discovered at Wuling Farm that Taiwan Blue Magpies had mated with Red-billed Blue Magpies and produced offspring.

Why is this so terrible? Because the Red-billed Blue Magpie is an introduced species; the Red-billed Blue Magpie came from mainland China. If Taiwan Blue Magpies and Red-billed Blue Magpies mate and spread, the genes of purebred Taiwan Blue Magpies will be mixed with those of the Red-billed Blue Magpie, and in the future we will no longer be able to see Taiwan Blue Magpies.

Now there is only one way: catch all the Red-billed Blue Magpies and send them back to mainland China.

In the big tree in the courtyard of our Kangning Elementary School, there are also a few Taiwan Blue Magpies nesting there. We love them very much and often climb up to the third floor to look at them. Taiwan Blue Magpies have a strong sense of territory. Once, when Dad went to see them, they thought Dad was a bad person, and to protect their home, they even swooped down and pecked Dad!

Comparison caption for the Taiwan Blue Magpie and the Red-billed Blue Magpie: The Taiwan Blue Magpie has a black head, blue belly, and yellow eyes, and its feathers are a very beautiful and vivid Prussian blue; the Red-billed Blue Magpie has a white head, white belly, and red eyes, and its feathers are dull in color, appearing a kind of grayish blue that is not so saturated, completely lacking the luster of the Taiwan Blue Magpie, and its body size is also slightly smaller than that of the Taiwan Blue Magpie.

Because the Taiwan Laughingthrush has a plump, chubby figure paired with yellow feathers, it is jokingly called the "sweet potato bird" by birders. It often moves furtively under the trees and on the ground, and some also call it the "mountain rat." It is a very common bird at mid-elevations in Taiwan, and we saw many of them at Daxueshan!