{"id":20281,"date":"2013-11-29T06:37:02","date_gmt":"2013-11-29T13:37:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=20281"},"modified":"2013-11-29T06:37:02","modified_gmt":"2013-11-29T13:37:02","slug":"grebe-running-across-a-ponds-surface-to-protect-its-prized-fish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2013\/11\/29\/grebe-running-across-a-ponds-surface-to-protect-its-prized-fish\/","title":{"rendered":"Grebe Running Across A Pond’s Surface To Protect Its Prized Fish"},"content":{"rendered":"

At first glance Pied-billed Grebes may come across as nondescript, bland little birds\u00a0without much personality but I’ve found the opposite to often be true.\u00a0 When they’re not resting or grooming they’re active, quite vocal and when they’re feeding in groups they’re often aggressive, even pugnacious.\u00a0\u00a0Their\u00a0kleptoparasitic tendencies can be entertaining to watch\u00a0in the extreme.<\/p>\n

I took this series of nine photos several years ago.\u00a0 The image quality suffered in several of them due to marginal lighting but I thought the behaviors were fascinating.\u00a0 I’ve posted two of the images previously but today I present “the rest of the story”.<\/p>\n

Notice the layer of ice at the bottom of the frame – that ice will come into play later in the sequence.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

As is common for the species, this adult grebe\u00a0caught a fish that was almost too big to swallow.\u00a0 It struggled to get it down for some time and in this image the slippery fish momentarily escaped.\u00a0 However, the stunned fish…<\/p>\n

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\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

was easily retrieved from just under the surface of the water.\u00a0 But in the few moments the grebe had its head underwater…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

another grebe (just out of\u00a0frame to the left)\u00a0rushed in to\u00a0attempt to\u00a0steal the fish.\u00a0 The rightful owner reacted explosively…<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

and began an evasive run across the surface of the pond with the potential thief in hot pursuit.\u00a0 These little birds can really scoot…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

so I was quite happy to get multiple images of the action where the bird was entirely within the frame and\u00a0acceptably sharp.<\/p>\n

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\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

As I look at these images I can hear in my head the cacophony of sounds from the flapping wings and slapping feet of the two birds as other grebes in the vicinity called out excitedly.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

It’s very rare for grebes to come out of the water because the rear placement of their legs and\u00a0feet makes walking almost impossible.\u00a0\u00a0The few times (three) I’ve seen them\u00a0on land I was barely able to maintain focus from laughing at their awkwardness.\u00a0 But this bird was so desperate to escape its tormentor that\u00a0it popped right up onto the ice and tried to run.\u00a0\u00a0 Its feet splayed out to the side on the extremely slippery ice and the bird went almost nowhere.\u00a0 It was truly hilarious to watch.<\/p>\n

The potential thief is the bird in the background.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

When it realized it couldn’t run, the grebe with the fish turned around to face the other bird.\u00a0 Though from this angle the pose may look like a threat I believe its wings were out only in an attempt to maintain balance as its feet slipped out from underneath the bird. (notice\u00a0the attachment point of the legs\u00a0at the rear of the body)<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n

\"pied-billed<\/a><\/p>\n

When the second grebe swam out of frame to the left this bird swallowed the\u00a0fish while it had the opportunity.<\/p>\n

I’m fascinated by bird behaviors.\u00a0 Given the choice of high quality images of static birds or lower quality images of interesting behaviors\u00a0I would\u00a0nearly always\u00a0choose the latter, in a heartbeat.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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

At first glance Pied-billed Grebes may come across as nondescript, bland little birds without much personality but I’ve found the opposite to often be true. When they’re not resting or grooming they’re active, quite vocal and when they’re feeding in groups they’re often aggressive, even pugnacious. Their kleptoparasitic tendencies can be entertaining to watch in the extreme.<\/p>\n

Notice the layer of ice at the bottom of the frame – that ice will come into play later in the sequence.<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20286,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[334,392,394,359],"tags":[1626,251,993,1763],"class_list":["post-20281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-birds","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","category-fighting-bird-behaviors","category-pied-billed-grebes","tag-kleptoparasite","tag-pied-billed-grebe","tag-podilymbus-podiceps","tag-walking"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/pied-billed-grebe-3136-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-5h7","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}