The Barred Owls I have observed spend a lot of time watching before they strike their prey.
When the time is right, the dive is very precise, and fast.
And sometimes after all that the prize is pond detritus. I didn’t see if he dropped this clump of leaves in flight or after he landed, but pretty soon he tried again.
The Bonaparte’s Gull and Forster’s Tern look a lot alike and I always have to check a reference when I see either. I happened to capture one of each in similar poses during my recent beach visit.
The gull is slightly larger, but when you see them zooming along above the ocean waves that is hard to tell.
After watching the relatively sedate Bonaparte’s Gulls Feeding at the beach a Forster’s Tern came along and showed off some different flying skills.
It was all about speed.
Hover, dive and repeat.
With the rolling waves and lack of contrast I didn’t get a full splash down image.
Yes, they are fast!
In between stronger gusts of wind the tern hovered higher over the water as he looked for food.
There is not much contrast in these images of a pair of Bonaparte’s Gulls feeding in the ocean surf. The day was dull and the birds coloration mostly matches the water, with only their black wing-tips and orange feet standing out.
However, they were fun to watch and gulls are great practice for in-flight bird photography due to their relatively slow speed and predictability.
It was also windy and this pair was expending a tremendous amount of energy for what was small food. Whatever they were catching they quickly swallowed without me seeing it.
They dropped in and lifted out of the water with ease and flew in tandem as they moved up the beach.
Myrtle Beach State Park, SC, 3/17/2019
I’ve only seen Glossy Ibis a few times in South Carolina and was surprised to come upon this one feeding in an old rice field pond at the end of February.
Ibis will eat about anything they find while probing mud or wetlands.
When they turn in the light the Glossy Ibis’ colors are spectacular.
A slow and methodical hunt was in progress.
A Green Heron was wading in water up to his chest, bent over in the stalking position, stretching out his neck.
Bam!
The snack he captured was so tiny, I wonder if it was worth all that time and effort.
Slowly and deliberately, a lone Great Egret stalked the pond as the fog lifted enough to make out the far shore.
Then a burst of speed and head plunge that churned up the water.
The water churning often helps the wading birds locate prey. He tried again with a big head splash. He didn’t get any meal on either of these efforts.
3/3/2019.
Great Blue Heron chicks have started to hatch around the rookery and Tuesday I spotted one in a high nest sticking his head up.
The first few days the adults will tear food apart and give it to their chicks. As the chicks grow, which happens pretty quickly, the adult dangles food in front of the chicks encouraging them to grab their own meal.
Either this chick couldn’t figure out how to get a bite of frog or wasn’t hungry, but after a minute or so the chick lost his chance.
It took a minute or so of concentrated effort, but the adult ate the frog in one bite.
I never get tired of watching this scene unfold:
The catch
The flip
Down the hatch
It’s gone
This was a tiny meal for an Anhinga and I have no idea how they locate such a fish while swimming under water. See my post Anhinga Feeding from two years ago to see how big a fish they are capable of swallowing.
Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers are named for their behavior of drilling small holes in trees then drinking the sap that runs into the wells. They get most of their food that way but also feed on insects they find under tree bark.
I’ve seen them peck at bark, mostly on the rough-barked trees and was surprised to see this one bobbing into a tree cavity. He was just about disappearing from my view as he reached in.
I didn’t see what, if anything, the Sapsucker was finding, but he kept at it for longer than I watched.
