Tree Swallow other feathers

 

I have watched Tree Swallows for a long time and this is the first time that I have seen them collecting the feathers of other birds. Certainly, in some places the Tree Swallow’s nests are lined with feathers, but this depends on local availability. In some places grass is used to soften the rougher surface of the nest. So while feathers are sometimes used, there is a question as to why feathers are being brought in on the day the chicks fledged. This would seem to make them irrelevant.

The feathers were always from other species, were all about the same size, and either white or grey. A number were seen on this final day before fledging, but only one of each colour is shown.

Apparently, such feathers have also been used in what appears to be a Tree Swallow game of catch, but this was not seen.

This feather being brought to the nest cavity was white.

This grey feather seemed stuck to the bird’s bill. It went to the nest, and away again.

 

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Tree Swallow feeding

 

This is the second in a series of three postings on the Tree Swallow. It is concerned with parents feeding their chicks in the nest. The first posting was about flying, and the last posting will be about feathers.

I watched the Tree Swallow’s cavity nest while parents flew in and out for about a week, at which time the nestlings fledged. During the early part of the week, the chicks were in the nest and the parents had to climb in to deliver the food that they had caught on the wing. Chicks were fed insects by both parents every 10 or 20 minutes. Increasingly, toward the end, the chicks looked out of the nest and begged. This picture was early on.

Some of the trips into the nest cavity had the objective of removing the faecal sac, a wrapper containing the chick’s excrement. This keeps excrement out of the nest, and the parent delivers it far off before dropping it to prevent predators from finding the nest. 

During the final days in the nest cavity, the chick is full size, but looks larger than its parents because its feathers are fresh. The parent looks as though it is delivering a wasp.

And the wasp is stuffed into the chick’s mouth.

This looks to be a mayfly being delivered.

The mayfly is stuffed into the chick’s mouth. (Mayflies are common in all warm months.)

 

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Tree Swallow flying

 

This is the first of what likely will be three postings about Tree Swallows. The first is just pictures of them flying. The second will be of it feeding its chicks. The third will be a mystery I have with it concerning its treatment of the feathers of other birds.

One might wonder why I would start with these shots of it flying. Well, the Tree Swallow is a rather fast flyer, and it just was not easy getting a number of close-up sharp in-air shots. So I show the few I have. They are offered without comment.

 

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Northern Flicker

 

The Northern Flicker, our most common woodpecker, is frequent, but often it is seen at a distance. Today, it was near, so I snapped some shots.

First, an old shot showing what the topside looks like. This is a male feeding its two chicks.

Today’s female flicker is flying towards me. The orange under feathers is striking.

And when the flicker is flying away, the underside is spectacular.

 

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June goulash

 

 

This is a smattering of June pictures that were not previously posted.

Our magpie likes open meadows with a few bushes, so they are not often found in this region. A few here occupy the grass lands of Procter. 

We certainly have muskrats, but they are infrequently seen.

An osprey carries a fish to its nest.

A mother mallard with her six chicks. One is nearly hidden behind another one.

A mother merganser with ten chicks (probably from two families).

The prize of this small collection is the common Song Sparrow for this one has, what I think is, a katydid in its bill.

 

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Like minds

 

This is a quirky posting. Most postings are about non-human nature. This is not.

I go for photographic walks with my daughter, Cynthia. We are often separated by anything from three metres to thirty metres as we observe nature.

Yesterday, we watched an osprey flying in circles over the lake hunting fish. It eventually caught one and brought it back our way. One picture I took I really liked. It was the osprey alighting on a distant tree branch, presumably to eat the tasty head of the fish (a common practice) before taking the rest to the nest. Alas, it promptly flew off again when it spotted another bird which, it feared, might try to steal the fish. But the picture of it landing on the tree branch was fine.

All this time, Cynthia was behind bushes somewhere not very far away doing her own observing.

I got home and showed her the osprey landing on the branch with its fish. Cynthia said, “I got one just like that.” I show both pictures. They were probably taken within a millisecond of each other. Minor differences reflect differences in our positions and cameras. Other than that, we both apparently thought: This might make a good shot. 

Cynthia’s picture of an osprey landing on a branch with its fish.

My picture of an osprey landing on the branch with its fish.

 

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Kingbird nest

 

Many larger birds reuse their (chick hatching) nest over and over again in successive years. Indeed to combat parasites, the Bald Eagle will keep adding a layer atop their nest until it is so large that the wind brings down the tree. At the other extreme, hummingbirds build a new nest each year. Between these sizes, birds might build new or reuse an older nest. The robin builds new (see previous posting, blog.kootenay-lake.ca/?p=34611), and the Eastern Kingbird reuses.

Indeed, yesterday, I found a Eastern Kingbird incubating in the same nest which it had been feeding chicks in last year on July 16, (blog.kootenay-lake.ca/?p=33529).

I will have watch it for the pending chicks.

A Eastern Kingbird incubates eggs in the same nest it used last year.

 

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Robin nesting and

 

The robin is generally a non-confrontational bird. It tolerates other species and even keeps moderately close company with humans. Well, that is its normal behaviour. But when you are deemed to be too close to it when it is feeding its chicks, it is also one (of the few?) that will attack you to drive you off. This does not seem to happen often, but it looks like it will happen again soon.

There are also a few other shots posted today.

This seemingly pregnant robin was collecting dried grass for its nest. At the time, I did not know where the nest was going to be, so I thought little of it.

Alas, the nest turned out to be atop a light near my door. 

Now, every time I go in or out, the robin squawks at me as it flies off. This is expected to last for about two weeks of incubation. After that there is another two weeks in which the nestlings are being fed by the mother. It is this period when she becomes really defensive and will attack passing humans. Sigh, there approaches about a month of caution.

Not all chicks are protected in the way that a robin’s are. These mallard chicks were really close with the mother not caring that a human is close.

Now two pictures of unrelated things. This is a Common Ringlet seen while hunting crab spiders on daisies.

And another shot of a crab spider sucking the juces out of a bug.

 

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Crab spider

 

This is the season of daisies. That means that this is also the time of crab spiders, the primary predator of daisy pollinators. The crab spider sits quietly on the daisy and waits for a pollinator. It then immobilizes it with a venom, and sucks its juices. 

Now the oxeye daisy is an invasive species, so whether the crab spider arrived with them, or adopted them upon daisy arrival is unknown. They do hunt from other flowers, but here the crab spider seems to prefer the daisy. So, look for crab spiders on daisies. But being a predator, the crab spider only waits on one out of every few hundred daisies, so it takes some careful looking to find them.

The daisy seems to suit the crab spider very well for the daisy flower has two main colours, yellow and white. Remarkably, the crab spider can camouflage itself in either yellow or white, although it takes a few days to completely change colour.

A crab spider rests on the central disc and matches its yellow colour.

This crab spider is partway between yellow and white. It has spotted a small bug to its left.

It grabs the bug and sucks it.

The male crab spider never grows as big as the female.

A white crab spider watches a fly get closer, but, the fly flew off before being caught.

 

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Crow harasses eagle

 

The battle went on for about ten minutes: a crow took on a Bald Eagle.

But the eagle didn’t try to tackle the crow, it just kept flying away.

Eagles generally like to raid the nests of others for food (now is the time for this) and crows do not like to lose their chicks, so crows actually tackle eagles and drive them off. The odd thing is that the eagle, a bigger more powerful bird, just flies away and avoids the fight. 

Now, it has been said that the eagle cannot be bothered to fight back, for it might be injured. But, the eagle will fight back with a bird that is closer to its own size, such as a osprey. Why then does it not want to tackle a much smaller crow? It is likely that, being smaller, the crow is much more manoeuvrable than the eagle, and so the risk to the eagle is correspondingly greater.

A crow drives off a juvenile Bald Eagle.

 

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