{"id":142934,"date":"2023-09-14T05:57:47","date_gmt":"2023-09-14T11:57:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=142934"},"modified":"2023-09-14T06:36:34","modified_gmt":"2023-09-14T12:36:34","slug":"american-coots-still-a-family-and-still-hanging-out-on-the-same-old-grebe-nest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2023\/09\/14\/american-coots-still-a-family-and-still-hanging-out-on-the-same-old-grebe-nest\/","title":{"rendered":"American Coots – Still A Family And Still Hanging Out On The Same Old Grebe Nest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Birds are endlessly interesting, coots included.<\/p>\n

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August 29<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sixteen days ago at Bear River MBR I found a small family of American Coots on an old nest that I’m confident I remember as an old Western Grebe nest from earlier in the summer. I didn’t think much of it at the time but I took a few photos because I thought it was a little unusual to find coots on a nest of any kind that late in the year and I thought they looked fairly photogenic up there.<\/p>\n

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There were actually four of them hanging out on the nest, the two adults on the right and left and two of their nearly fully grown youngsters. Another reason they caught my eye was because by then most of this year’s young coots on the refuge had already been driven from their natal territory by their parents and were living independently.<\/p>\n

And none of the other coots that I noticed were still on nests, of any kind.<\/p>\n

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August 30<\/strong><\/p>\n

The next day the coot family was still hanging out on the nest. Two of them swam off as I approached, with an adult and a youngster left behind.<\/p>\n

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September 5<\/strong><\/p>\n

Six days later they were still there, with two of them on the nest and two on the water.<\/p>\n

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September 11<\/strong><\/p>\n

Six days after that I was surprised to find them still there. Two were on the nest and…<\/p>\n

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two were swimming nearby. This is one of only two shots I got that included all four of them.<\/p>\n

You may have noticed that the nest is now looking pretty waterlogged and has rotated 180\u00b0 in the water. Western Grebe nests are “built up from bottom or a submerged snag, or floating in up to 3 m of water and anchored to emergent or floating plants.” I suspect that this nest is anchored to the vertical snag we see poking out of the water in the last three photos, allowing it to rotate like that as the water current and depth changes in the canal.<\/p>\n

I’m not sure how unusual all this is but it’s certainly unusual in my experience to see coots maintaining their family unit for this long and to see them doing it on what I believe is a nest of another species.<\/p>\n

And interestingly, these coots and their adopted nest are located…<\/p>\n

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only a very short distance from the spot where I found “Old Stoneface” on three of the four same days that I found the coots on the nest. After finding the heron in almost the same place that many days in a row I was beginning to think he was a permanent fixture there.<\/p>\n

Maybe there’s something in the water…<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Birds are endlessly interesting. (7 photos)<\/p>\n

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