Continuing with the Florida bird series, here are a few interesting prey captures.
This Laughing Gull surprised us by grabbing a dragonfly (possibly a Giant Darner) right out of the air and eating it.
Another gull found a large shrimp and briefly paused to show it off before being chased around by a bunch of other gulls. A prize like this is worth stealing!
A Black-Bellied Plover pulled up some kind of giant worm. This, too, turned out to be a catch that caused many other birds to try and steal.
One of my favorite bird interactions was this Little Blue Heron catching a fish.
In order to eat the fish, the heron has to spend a bit of time breaking it up. As it does this, note the legs of a gull creeping in on the upper right of the photo below.
As the heron was distracted, the gull made its move.
The heron saw the gull moving in on its lunch and took evasive action.
The heron kept maneuvering to keep its back to the gull as it continued to crush the fish so it could eventually swallow it.
Meanwhile, a couple of Willets had some kind of disagreement on the beach. The one on the right did not like having the one on the left around and kept hassling it. Their conversation sounded pretty heated.
A more relaxed Willet kicking up some sea foam:
Peeps coexisting peacefully on the beach:
Another Black-Bellied Plover:
Winter time is a challenge for identifying shorebirds as their plumage is mostly drab and some species can look alike. I appreciate the challenge of identifying them this time of year, but I do look forward to summer when all of these birds can be found in their more colorful breeding plumage in the NYC area, in places like Jamaica Bay.
No comments:
Post a Comment