Behaviors – Page 102 – Feathered Photography

Willet Wars

Earlier this week Mia and I witnessed an incredible display of avian aggression on Antelope Island. I’ve often seen and photographed battling birds but I’ve never before seen such a long-lasting and vicious fight as this one between two Willets. It lasted for over 20 minutes and I took 413 photos of the action but don’t expect high quality images in this post as the conditions were far from ideal. We had contrasty sidelight, lots of obstructingvegetation between us and the birds and constantly changing lighting conditions as clouds moved in and out and the birds moved from place to place as the battle raged. But as I’ve stated before on this blog I’ll often post images of interesting behaviors even if they are less than perfect in image quality. And to me this behavior was certainly interesting. Canon 7D, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc, 1/1600, f/5.6, ISO 500 The Willets were already fighting as we approached them in my pickup and they mostly ignored us after pausing for a few seconds when we first drove up. Canon 7D, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc, 1/1250, f/5.6, ISO 500 In this and the following image the bird on the right had its bill tightly clamped on the upper mandible of the other bird. Canon 7D, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc, 1/1250, f/5.6, ISO 500 The bird on the left was desperately trying to break the grip of its tormentor but it took some struggling before it finally succeeded. Canon 7D, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc, 1/1250, f/5.6, ISO…

A Loggerhead Shrike, a Spider and Spit

A few days ago Mia and I found this Loggerhead Shrike sitting prettily on a dried sunflower on Antelope Island. The bird was using the sunflower as a hunting perch. 1/1600, f/8, ISO 500 I’ve always been amazed by the incredible eyesight of many bird species. This shrike somehow spotted a spider crawling through the thick grass about 20 feet away from where it was perched and immediately flew down to grab it. 1/1600, f/7.1, ISO 500 It was a relatively small spider and I have no idea how the shrike was able to see it in all the dense grass. Even though the background is busy here I still liked the shot for the interesting look at both the spider and the tongue of the shrike. It’s my presumption from looking at this photo that the saliva of the shrike is viscous and sticky, enabling the prey to stay attached to the tongue during the very fast process of pulling the spider to the back of the throat with the tongue. 1/1600, f/7.1, ISO 500 A heavily cropped, close-up view of the same image provides a clue. You can see that there’s a sheet of saliva stretched between the bottom of the tongue and the floor of the lower mandible and it does appear to be quite viscous. I had no idea that it would be so “juicy” in there. Nothing earth-shattering here, just some avian trivia in a photo that I found interesting (yes, my interests can be…

Fish Eating Northern Harriers

As I’ve mentioned before in this blog, the winter of 2008 was a particularly brutal one in northern Utah. During January and February there was much more snow than usual and it was bitterly cold. During most winters our Northern Harriers rely primarily on voles as a food supply but in 2008 with the voles under the deep crusty snow our harriers were desperate for food. Birds of North America Online provides extensive information on the dietary habits of harriers. It lists small to medium-sized mammals (primarily rodents), birds, reptiles and frogs as harrier food sources, stating further that the diet of harriers during winter in their northern range (which includes northern Utah) consists of voles “almost exclusively”. I can find no mention of harriers eating fish, ever! Each year in early February some of our wetlands managers treat some of our ponds with rotenone (a chemical that prevents oxygen from being absorbed across fish gill membranes) in an effort to control the invasive and damaging carp that do so much damage to the emergent vegetation which is so vital for waterfowl. So, in 2008 for a few weeks, our desperate and starving harriers began to eat fish! In the three winters since then I have never seen harriers eating fish even though the dead carp are always plentiful after the rotenone kill. 1/1250, 1/1000, ISO 500 Many of the carp are brought to the shores or ice surface by Bald Eagles which makes them available to the harriers who generally cannot retrieve them from the water. 1/1250, f/8, ISO…

White-crowned Sparrow Bathing in a Lilac Bush

I have a serious case of unrequited spring fever. It’s been a long and dreary winter and it’s not over yet so when I stumbled across these images from last spring a few days ago I decided they were worthy of a post. Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2500, f/8, ISO 640 It was just after a spring rain in May last year when the sun came out and I noticed this male White-crowned Sparrow fluttering around in my neighbor’s lilac bush so I quickly grabbed my gear and started firing away. Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/3200, f/8, ISO 640 The sparrow seemed so ecstatic over his bath that he let me get close and pretty much ignored me. Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2500, f/8, ISO 640 The leaves and especially the flowers were loaded with water and the sparrow was taking full advantage of the situation. Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2000, f/8, ISO 640 And the ecstasy continues. I guess there’s just something special about bathing in lilac water… Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2000, f/8, ISO 640 Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2000, f/8, ISO 640 Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2500, f/8, ISO 640 Canon 7D, 1.4 tc, tripod, 1/2500, f/8, ISO 640 Some of these photos are far from perfect – the light was harsh, the bird was side-lit, I often didn’t get a catch light in the eye and the contrast was high, especially…

Long-tailed Weasel – Efficient Hunter and Cannibal

Long-tailed Weasels are obligate carnivores (eat meat exclusively), preying largely on smaller rodents but also take rabbits, chipmunks and birds – including poultry. They take down prey several times their size and occasionally go on killing sprees triggered by the smell of blood. Long-tailed Weasel, summer molt Their long black tipped tail, slender bodies and darker brown coloration above with creamy white ventral parts are identifying features. The very similar Short-tailed Weasel is smaller and has whiter feet. In this case the prey is another weasel While driving the loop road at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge this weasel ran in front of us carrying another weasel that it had apparently killed. Weasels are cannibalistic at times and I’m relatively certain that this kill was destined as a meal rather than the kill being made simply out of aggression because the winning weasel was very reluctant to abandon its prize even with us very close. It took a great effort for the weasel to carry its long-bodied kin through the grasses and reeds and it simply would not abandon it. Hopping with it’s prey Here you can get a feel for how difficult it was to drag the long body through all the obstructions so most of the time it would hop forward, one jump at a time, presumably with its burrow as a goal. Long-tailed Weasel, winter molt As winter approaches, northern weasels molt to white (while retaining the black tipped tail) – the advantage of this is obvious. Interestingly, many weasels living in the southern part of their range…

Northern Harrier Struggling to Expel a Pellet

Except for owls, all raptors have a crop for excess food storage. The parts of the prey that are indigestible are formed into a pellet in the gizzard and then regurgitated out of the mouth. These pellets contain hair, feathers, exoskeletons and sometimes (in the case of owls especially) the bones of their prey. I’ve noticed with many raptor species that expelling a pellet can be a difficult process, bordering on traumatic. Such was the case with this juvenile male Northern Harrier. I was watching this bird through my lens but not planning on getting any quality photos because the bird was strongly side-lit. But when he began trying to expel a pellet I couldn’t resist clicking away. Because of the side-lighting and relatively soft focus the images are not of high quality but I thought the behavior was interesting enough for a blog post anyway. All of the photos in this series are posted in the order that they were taken. The beginning of the struggle to expel the pellet Here the harrier is shaking his head from side to side to try to dislodge the pellet But with the effort he begins to lose his balance on the perch And almost falls over backward He begins to recover And then falls forward Begins to recover again Still recovering Recovered, but still with the pellet stuck in his mouth And finally the pellet has been expelled. As luck would have it my buffer had filled up and I missed…

Bald Eagle Eating a Fish in Mid-air

I’ve often seen Bald Eagles carrying fish but never one actually consuming the meal while flying. Until yesterday, when I got some photos of the behavior. Thanks to Mia for calling my attention to it or I may have missed the whole thing. Eating carp in flight At first I wondered if this eagle was only killing the carp with a lethal bite as I have seen other raptors do in-flight, but then I remembered that it was already dead when it was picked up by the eagle. These fish were killed by refuge personnel (they use rotenone) in order to prevent damage to the wetlands done by these invasive fish. Falling fish scales The four photos in this sequence are in the order that they happened. Here you can see scales and debris falling from the carp as the eagles very sharp bill does its damage. Part of the head, including gill flap (operculum) being torn off I suspect that the reason this eagle chose to consume at least part of its meal in flight has to do with competition. There weren’t many fish available and lots of hungry gulls and eagles to squabble over them. If an eagle tried to eat a fish on the ice (the ponds were mostly frozen) other birds would usually challenge them for the meal. Even gulls were at times very aggressive toward the eagles. On several occasions I observed gulls biting the tails of the eagles while both were in flight. Perhaps this eagle figured it had…

Handedness in Short-eared Owls

Last summer Mia and I spent four days photographing a family of Short-eared Owls in Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. There were two baby owls in a nest under a sagebrush guarded over constantly by the female while the male hunted and brought in food. That food in every instance that we saw was a vole (mouse-like rodent). Many of the photos I took were of the male in flight, returning to the area of the nest with a vole in his talons. Male with vole It wasn’t until I returned home and began processing the images that I began to notice that the male always seemed to carry the vole in its left foot. This piqued my curiosity about something I’d never considered – do some birds show “handedness” – the preference of using one limb as opposed to the other? Could this male owl, or perhaps all Short-eared Owls, be left-“handed”? Once again, carrying the vole in the left foot So I decided to do an inventory of my images of these birds to see what would turn up. After culling my photos of these owls from this trip I had 271 photos to go through. Most of those were flight shots of the male and in more than half of them he was carrying a vole. My goal was to try to determine how many “sorties” he made with a vole that I had photographed (I often got multiple shots of the male with the same vole in the same sortie) and determine what percentage of the time he…

Northern Harriers Battle over a Mallard

Occasionally we have brutally cold winters here in northern Utah. It’s my opinion that unusually cold temperatures when combined with thick crusted snow gives harriers little access to their staple food around here – voles. Survival then becomes tenuous for the harriers and they’re forced to move on to other food sources like small birds, dead carp and waterfowl. When a large meal like a carp or duck is available many harriers often fight over the food item and they do so with ferocity. During less stressful times of the year I often see these birds skirmish but then it almost seems like a playful interlude that they do simply for “fun”. Not so when it’s very cold and food is scarce – then it’s deadly serious and incredibly interesting to observe and photograph. First, a disclaimer. Some of the photos I’ll present here would wither under the scrutiny of critique because of cut off or clipped wings, missing eyes or heads, lack of catch lights and difficult and rapidly changing lighting conditions. My intent here is to show the behavior with the best images I have but some of them do have obvious flaws. The calm before the storm I didn’t see harriers make this Mallard kill but it was still fresh when I came across this bird on the duck. At first I though I’d simply be photographing the harrier calmly enjoying its meal but I was very mistaken. Thinking about challenging the larger bird for the meal It didn’t take long for other birds to challenge her for the Mallard. Some were timid…

Bathing Cinnamon Teal/Green-winged Teal hybrid

Though bathing is a common activity for waterfowl it can make for some interesting photographs. I found this bird at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge at the end of May last year. Cinnamon Teal x Green-winged Teal Hybrid male While I was processing some of the images I noticed the unusual crescent-shaped marking running through the eye to the back of the head that is typical of the Green-winged Teal. I asked several very knowledgeable birders about this bird and they think this is a CT/GWT hybrid, which apparently is quite unusual. Red eye looking at you through a layer of water While bathing he would repeatedly dunk his head and shoulders under water and then lift them up, which would roll water over its back and wings. An interesting process to watch and photograph at such close range. Here he’s looking at me through a layer of water over his head and eye as he brings his head out of the water. Forcing water over the back Here’s the water on the back. Washing the back feathers Then he would shake vigorously which would wash the back and upper wing feathers and send water droplets flying. Rearranging the wing feathers After so much vigorous activity the feathers, particularly those in the wing, needed rearranging to put them in their proper places. Preening after the bath Then came the preening. Lots of it. Here he is grooming individual breast/lower neck feathers. After the bath And here…

Rough-legged Hawk – Defensive Posture

Most birds are defensive of their territories and space and raptors are certainly no exception. Rough-legged Hawks and Northern Harriers both prey heavily on voles (mice-like rodents) so when a new bird of prey comes in to the established hunting territory of another there are often conflicts, with the established bird attempting to drive off the interloper to avoid competition for food resources. Rough-legged Hawk As I was photographing this Rough-legged hawk sitting peacefully in a tree I noted a definite change in its demeanor so I looked around and spotted a Northern Harrier speeding toward the hawk from my right. I anticipated that the harrier would “buzz” the roughie and since I was much too close to get both birds in the frame when it happened I decided to concentrate on the reaction of the hawk as the interaction occurred. I never did get the harrier in the frame in any of the shots. In the image above, the roughie hasn’t yet seen the harrier coming in (nor have I). The incoming Northern Harrier has been spotted When I noticed this posture change in the roughie I knew something was up, so I looked in the direction the bird was focused on and saw the harrier coming in fast. Beginning to react Here the hawk is beginning to react to the swift and aggressive approach of the harrier by beginning to fluff up. Defensive posture This shot was taken when the harrier, traveling very fast, was closest to the hawk – roughly three…

Pied-billed Grebe Feeding Behaviors

Pied-billed Grebes are fascinating little birds with a chip on their shoulders. They are pugnacious, full of personality and quite small. They don’t seem to get a lot of attention from bird photographers, possibly because of their generally drab colors and because they’re so common. I really enjoy watching and photographing their behaviors. I’ve stated here before that “behavior” is a major focus of this blog and if I have images of interesting behaviors that are less than perfect technically I will still post them if they illustrate the behavior well. There are several in that category in this post. Grebe with young carp Carp are the primary food for these birds in many of the ponds I frequent. Even young fish can make a huge mouthful for these very small grebes. Swallowing a carp I’ve seen it take several minutes for a grebe to finally work one of these huge (for them) fish down their throats. And I’ve yet to see one give up on the meal because it’s too big. A slippery meal Fish are slimy and slippery and sometimes get away from the grebe temporarily, though they always seem to be recaptured. A potential thief in the background These birds are very social so there’s nearly always other grebes close by when one catches a meal and some of them will invariably try to steal the prize from its rightful owner. This can make for some very interesting but challenging encounters for the photographer because the action is usually so…

Black-billed Magpie Nesting Behavior

This past spring and summer I had the opportunity to observe and photograph nesting behaviors of Black-billed Magpies on Antelope Island in northern Utah. Magpies are common in Utah and much of the western US but they’re typically difficult to approach (and very challenging to photograph well because of the contrast of their coal-black and almost pure white plumage) but this pair of birds was so intent on their nest-building activities that they virtually ignored my presence. Mated pair of Black-billed Magpies Magpies are monogamous and typically mate for life. This is a mated pair on top of their domed nest in a sagebrush. The male is on the left, the female on the right – males are about 20% larger than females so they are sexually dimorphic. As you can see from the muddy bill of the female they’ve been actively building the mud-bowl found inside the nest. Typically the male provides the heavier branches and sticks for the nest and the female delivers most of the mud for the mud bowl, which probably explains why the female’s bill is so muddy while the male’s is not. Obtaining mud for then nest The mud for the bowl of the nest was obtained wherever the birds could find it. When we’d had dry weather they would have to fly quite a distance to get any but after a recent rain they would often get it very close by. This bird has just scooped up a bill-full. When it’s available they’ll sometimes use fresh cattle or bison dung in place…

American Kestrel – The Killing Bite

I have watched American Kestrels consume their prey up close many times. Usually that prey has been a vole but occasionally it’s been a small bird or mouse. But until this day the prey had always been already dead when I arrived on the scene. It was cold and snowy when I spotted this male kestrel with a mouse (I was surprised it wasn’t a vole) that was still very much alive. As a side note I want to add here that this kestrel was not baited. Many photographs are taken of raptors when they’ve been baited by mice (they can be bought at pet stores) that have been provided as an enticement by the photographer. That was not the case here – I do not bait. Male kestrel with live mouse It was obvious that the mouse was alive because it was struggling slightly, its tail was twitching and its eyes were open. In my experience these birds often prefer a more stable perch than this while they eat their meal – something like a fencepost or pole that provides some kind of platform from which to eat. So I didn’t think he would eat the mouse here and I was right. He gave me time for a few quick shots and then flew off to another perch. Kestrel on second perch He didn’t go far however and I was able to approach him again. This next perch was also precarious to eat from because the wind was blowing and both perch and bird were swaying in the breeze. …

Canvasback – Feeding and Fighting Behavior

In April of 2008 I photographed some interesting Canvasback feeding and fighting behaviors at a local pond. At the time I was still a relative novice at bird photography so I’ll say up front that this blog post is more about the behaviors than it is about image quality. The almost white plumage and dark head made for a tricky exposure for a beginner and there was a significant issue with specular highlights caused by reflections off of the shiny mud. Dive, eyes open On this day there was one drake feeding quite close to me and I was very interested in the whole process. He would continually dive down to the muck at the bottom of the pond and come up with his head completely covered in thick dark mud. Sometimes he would dive with his eyes open, like this. Dive, eyes closed And other times he would dive with his eyes closed. Either way, mud and grit in the eyes never seemed to be a problem for him. Ol’ Muddy Head 1 When he would emerge, this is what he would look like. Ol’ Muddy Head 2 And this. It never failed – a true mud facial. Canvasbacks are often referred to as the “aristocrats of ducks” but it’s hard to look very aristocratic with a face full of mud. Shakin’ the mud off Occasionally he would try to shake as much of the mud off as possible but it never seemed to change the look of him…

Category: Behaviors