![\"western](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/western-grebe-1534-ron-dudley.jpg\")
<\/p>\nThe trials and tribulations of motherhood aren’t restricted to humankind.<\/p>\n
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1\/2500, f\/8, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Western Grebe chicks are extraordinarily loud and demanding and as they become larger the pressures to keep them fed and satisfied increases exponentially. The chick in the water had been swimming behind its mother as its sibling rode up top when it\u00a0tried to pass her in its attempt to get at any potential food from the male parent in front of them before its sibling did (I’ve deliberately cropped this image to include the tail of the male). But it was so close to its mother that her weight and momentum almost forced the chick completely underwater.<\/p>\n The loud demands of grebe chicks for food seem never-ending. For many weeks! When I’m in the\u00a0marshes in summer the impatient calls of\u00a0the youngsters echo across the water from dawn to dusk. I often think to myself that the parent birds must have endless patience with them to put up with that endless cacophony for so long. I know that I tire of it myself after only a\u00a0short time\u00a0in the field and sometimes as I’m driving home the annoying screeching of the chicks is still ringing in my ears.\u00a0Western Grebe parents (both sexes) deserve some kind of parenting award.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n And\u00a0so did my own mother.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This is my mother Lorna Prince as she graduated from nursing school in Calgary, Alberta as an\u00a0RN in 1944. She wanted to marry my father before he went overseas to fight the Japanese during World War II but dad insisted they wait to see if he made it home at all. So she worked as a nurse in Calgary and Vancouver until he eventually returned in spring of 1946. I’ll never forget her horror stories of nursing cowboys back to health who had been severely injured in the annual\u00a0Calgary Stampede. Those Chuckwagon Races were brutal back then.<\/p>\n My parents married in April of 1946 in Cut Bank, Montana and I appeared thirteen months after that. Younger sisters Mona and Sheila came along later. All her life mom was the epitome of\u00a0a\u00a0loving, hard-working mother and wife. It’s usually a full-time job to be a farm wife but during the years I was growing up she also worked full-time as a nurse in town. She usually worked\u00a0nights so she could spend as much\u00a0time with her family as possible.\u00a0With that kind of schedule she never got enough sleep but she was nearly always cheerful and\u00a0fiercely devoted to her\u00a0family.<\/p>\n Here’s\u00a0one of many examples of her devotion to family: As a young woman my sister Mona developed an insidious cancer and her family in California needed help dealing with the situation so my parents pulled up their Montana roots lock, stock and barrel\u00a0and moved to California to be with them. Many years later Mona eventually succumbed to her disease but having my parents there, particularly my nurse mother, was a great help to Mona and her family.\u00a0Mom (and dad)\u00a0would have\u00a0it no other way.<\/p>\n Being a good mother usually includes being a good wife so I can’t resist relating one final story. When my parents were married in the spring of 1946 it was in the middle of spring planting on the farm so they were unable to enjoy a honeymoon at that time. Several months later, in the summer, they took a delayed honeymoon to Great Falls, Montana where the plan was for them to pamper themselves for a few days. On the afternoon they arrived in Great Falls they separated for a few hours so mom could get her hair done (quite a luxury for her) and dad could browse some of the stores for farm supplies. Their plan was to meet at the car later in the afternoon and then get\u00a0a nice\u00a0hotel room for an extended weekend in the “big city”.<\/p>\n But when mom arrived at the car there was dad with a\u00a0guilty look on his face and a trunk full of peeping baby chicks (chickens) that now had to be delivered to the farm forthwith (120 miles away). The honeymoon was scrapped and my mom was furious. Years later she’d tell that story with a big smile on her face but I can\u00a0guarantee you she wasn’t smiling at the time. I wouldn’t have wanted to be my father during that two hour ride home…<\/p>\n Between us three kids and my\u00a0father my mother had her work cut out for her! I miss them both, as I do Mona. Thankfully Sheila and I are still hanging in there.<\/p>\n Happy Mother’s Day to all you mothers out there. For all you do for all of us, every day should be Mother’s Day.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The trials and tribulations of motherhood aren’t restricted to humankind.<\/p>\n![\"lorna](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/lorna-june-prince-dudley-b.jpg\")
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