"birding" fun

[birder]

Beautiful Chris and good for the soul.

[birder]

With the longer days the ice had to melt, none too soon though. We've had some sunny days, and today with rain/mix. The ice picture is mostly Common Mergansers (mergs) with some Common Goldeneyes. The sunny day Goldeneye shot surprised me how pretty it was, the mergs caught in the rain from today.
Lots of happy birds around here now, more are on their way too. On one sunny day a mourning cloak butterfly was up after hibernating the winter.

[Don Boose]

These are so pretty. Makes me miss the days on the water at Cape May (although we DO have white egrets, blue herons, belted kingfishers, Canadian geese, and mallards - and, more rarely, ospreys).

[rmks2000]

Glen,

Something of interest occurred last month regarding Mergansers. A friend saw three eaglets perform a coordinated attack on a merganser while the flock was on a frozen lake in our town. One eaglet made the flock take flight while a second eaglet swooped down and knocked one merg back onto the ice. The third then came up and held down the merg with its' talon. They then proceeded to have their meal. This is the first time that I ever heard of such an attack. Reminded me of the raptors from Jurassic Park. But then again, eagles are just modern dinosaurs.

There were two adult eagles on the other side of the lake, so we are hoping that will nest soon.

Bob

[Kevin WS]

Nice clear shots Glen. The second one - a very pretty bird. It is a ?? (I am too tired to try and look it up!).

-----------------------------------

Bob - that is very interesting indeed, especially since eaglets are involved.

Harris's Hawks are the only know raptors that are documented (as far as I am aware) as co-operating in hunting. Could this be what they were in fact? Does your friend know?

It is also possible that it was just learning/hunting behaviour by the eaglets that tied into the sequence your friend described, rather than a true co-ordinated attack. Again to disprove this your friend needs to watch and see if the eaglets continue behaviour as a group. It would be worthwhile also trying to video the behaviour, as it could lead to an interesting further discovery in raptor behaviour.

I was fortunate to meet Leslie Brown, one of the worlds leading Ornithologists at the time and a raptor expert. I remember him saying that many of the behavioural discoveries he made came through initial chance observation...

[rmks2000]

Kevin,

My friend was very confident that they were Bald Eagle eaglets, and I don't believe that Harris's Hawks reside in the Northeast US, but I've been wrong on many things before. I can certainly ask him. And yes, it could possibly be a learning behavior. Now that the lake has thawed I don't know if such an opportunity will present itself again, but I am certainly hopeful.

[SCEtoAUX]

Great pics. The one of the Goldeneye is very interesting.

[Kevin WS]

Thanks, Bob or the additional info. You are correct on the distribution - it would not be a Harris's Hawk. Sure your friend will know hopefully. Maybe there is still a discovery in the cards!

Your post led me to look up and read a bit more on Harris's Hawk - what a lovely bird. A pity it is in decline. They also indulge in another unique raptor activity - "stacking". There is a photo of this in the second link below.

https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/harriss-hawk

https://www.newscientist.com/article...erative-packs/

[Kevin WS]

Been away and out of action really for over two weeks - doing some contracting work, and then a week in the bush. No modelling and no data for the whole time. Nice in a way.

Saw quite a few birds and animals, and got a couple of pictures that I think will be of interest. So will post the odd ones as I find the time to go through and convert them (they are all in RAW).

In the meantime, here is the first one of the very many colourful starlings we have.

Most of the starlings are this iridescent blue, and are quite hard to distinguish from one another - the colours around the eyes, and of the beaks and legs, and the size and shape of the black patch on the head are the distinguishing features generally used to sort out one starling family from another.

They are hard to photograph - it is difficult to capture the iridescent blue.

This particular one is a Black Bellied Starling (it does not have a black belly!), and is not a common sighting - it is a bit sulky in its behaviour.

[Don Boose]

With the iridescent blue and the bright eyes, it is a very impressive bird.

As far as I know, we have only one starling (imported from Europe), and it is drab and speckled - and abundant!

Don