Exploring Kootenay Lake

Most of our Common Loons spend the winter at the coast and the rest of the year on inland lakes. I generally see my first loon of the year in April, and early this morning, one obliged.

This morning’s visitor was far out on the Lake, so the image is a bit soft, but a loon it is.

From a distance, I thought the bush was covered with butterflies. But, they turned out to be Ruby-crowned Kinglets, tiny birds even smaller than chickadees.

These frenetic birds were difficult to photograph as they hardly ever stopped moving.

Only males show the ruby crown, and even for them it is usually hidden.

For those who gain their insights into the natural world from seasonal decorations, Christmas trees are uniformly conical, snow crystals are always stellar, and turkeys display in the fall just in time to be decapitated for the Thanksgiving table. The other nonsense aside, spring is when Wild Turkeys display and strut. 

This is the first time I have witnessed this ostentation.

The display was from a lone tom wandering amongst a couple of dozen hens. He would trot over to one group and they would turn away and carry on snacking. He would then try another group with the same depressing result.

Somehow the whole scene was mildly reminiscent of the awkwardness of a junior-high dance. I sympathized.

Ospreys have returned. On April 7^th, Derek Kite saw two; the next day, I saw this one. At this time of the year, some ospreys are passing through to northern climes, but this one, sizing up a nest, will probably stay locally.

I was away from the Lake for a few days, but continued to take pictures. While these five bird portraits are from afar, each is of a species I have previously seen and photographed locally, some quite recently. I rather like these views.

Red-winged Blackbird

Great Blue Heron

Northern Shoveler

Sandhill Crane

Wood Duck

Tree Swallows are back and competing for both mates and nesting sites. 

Tree Swallows don’t build their own nests but make use of cavities previously carved by other birds, often woodpeckers. The cavity in the piling, below, was made by a flicker a decade ago and has been taken over by swallows in the last few years. Males find and defend a potential cavity and then offer it to a female. A male without a cavity nest can father chicks, but a female without one cannot reproduce.

Owing to the competition among Tree Swallows, they are combative. Males attack other males; Females attack other females. Further, some apparent attacks may be acrobatic displays of fitness between potential partners. Only the birds know what they are doing.

It is probably a male that is looking out of this cavity in an attempt to attract a female to his find. But, is that a competitive male or an interested female on top of the piling?

The two birds then set about doing some acrobatic flying. The interpretation of this depends upon whether it is same-sex aggression or opposite-sex courting.

The acrobatics went on for a minute or two.