1\/2500, f\/8, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\nI photographed this family of Western Grebes in August of 2015 at Bear River MBR as one of the adults was back brooding chicks (carrying them on their back). In this situation it’s always the other parent that provides food (usually small fish) for the youngsters and occasionally for the back brooding adult. When this photo was taken the other parent had just swam past them (we can see its wake in the water and I’ve cropped the image to include the tip of its tail).<\/p>\n
Just before the second parent passed them one of the chicks jumped overboard and was swimming alongside the adult but it was so excited about the possibility of getting food from the parent in the lead, and getting that food before its sibling did, it made the mistake of swimming directly in front of the adult it had been riding on. So the poor little guy was pushed almost completely beneath the surface as the faster adult began to run over it. All but the top of its head disappeared beneath the surface before it was able to get to the other side of the adult and resurface.<\/p>\n
Sadly, due to water management and phragmites control decisions made by managers at Bear River MBR almost the entire area of the refuge that the public has access to has been dry for three consecutive summers now. This has resulted in much reduced nesting habitat for grebes and other birds and an almost complete lack of opportunity for the public to view and enjoy bird behaviors like these.<\/p>\n
I’ve asked Bear River MBR to make their management plan for that area of the refuge (unit 2D) public but they not only haven’t done so, they’ve completely ignored my request (and similar requests from others).<\/p>\n
Personally I take issue with some of their management decisions but that’s a story for another time and eventually for another blog post.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Addendum #1: I’ve sent a link to this post to Erin Holmes the new manager at BRMBR because I wanted to be transparent about making my concerns about the refuge public. If she has any input, including possible clarifications or errors I may have made, I’ll include them at the first opportunity. <\/em>Or perhaps she’ll comment herself. That’s unlikely but who knows…<\/em><\/p>\nMy purpose certainly isn’t to stir up trouble. It’s just to find out what’s really going on out there. And most importantly, why. In the meantime birds are paying the price and they’ve been doing so for three years now.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Addendum #2 @ 9:13 AM: I just received an email response from Erin Holmes, new manager at BRMBR. She invited me to sit down and visit with her about “the future of the refuge” so I’m hoping to take her up on her offer tomorrow morning if it fits into both of our schedules. If it happens I’ll report back.<\/em><\/p>\nHow refreshing to find a responsive and knowledgeable federal employee with some authority who’s willing to discuss such matters! Thank you, Erin.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gluttony can get one in trouble.<\/p>\n
Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74711,"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":[338,334,8,392,391,366],"tags":[731,738,49,740,4672,322],"class_list":["post-74710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bear-river-migratory-bird-refuge-favorite-locations","category-birds","category-ecology-and-environment","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","category-nesting-and-mating","category-western-grebes","tag-aechmophorus-occidentalis","tag-back-brooding","tag-bear-river-migratory-bird-refuge","tag-chicks","tag-resource-management-decisions","tag-western-grebe"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/western-grebe-1535-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-jr0","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74710","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=74710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/western-grebe-1535-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"western-grebe-1535-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n