Black-necked Stilts at Bear River

After years of looking for American Avocets, I expect to see Black-necked Stilts wherever we find Avocets.  Black-necked Stilts and Avocets are similar in many ways, including their diets. Both species are omnivores, eating small fish, insects, and crustaceans. Both feed on the Brine Shrimp found in the Great Salt Lake.

I’ll admit, though, I was still surprised to find a Black-necked Stilt nest less than a hundred yards away from the Avocet nest we had just seen.

Black-necked Stilt on nest

This is the first time I can remember ever seeing a Black-necked Stilt nest (but that might be because my memory isn’t quite as good as it used to be because the post-generated link clearly shows a Black-necked Stilt nest.

Although we saw large flocks of stilts on the way to the refuge, most of the stilts on the sanctuary were either in pairs or were feeding alone.

Black-necked Stilt

Strangely, American Avocets and Black-necked Stilts seem to get along quite well when feeding together, sometimes quite close together.  Black-necked Stilts, on the other hand, seem less tolerant of fellow stilts when feeding.  They tend to be territorial, particularly during breeding season, and these two seemed more combative than most.

Stilts fighting

Neither bird seemed to be injured, and it gave me a chance to capture the loser as it flew a safe distance away.

Black-necked Stilt landing

We managed to get closer to these birds than we ever have before, 

and what really stood out to me were those bright reddish-orange legs, particularly how long they appeared compared to the bird’s overall size.  When I asked Bard about those legs it came up with:

The black-necked stilt is a shorebird with long, thin legs that are proportionally longer than those of any other bird. The legs of a black-necked stilt are about 1.5 times the length of its body, and they can reach up to 2 feet (60 centimeters) in length. The legs are pink or reddish in color, and they help the stilt to wade in shallow water and reach for prey.

The stilt’s long legs are an adaptation to its habitat. Black-necked stilts live in wetlands, where they feed on small insects, crustaceans, and other aquatic animals. The long legs allow the stilt to stand in shallow water without sinking, and they also help the stilt to reach prey that is hidden in the mud.

The long legs of the black-necked stilt are also a disadvantage in some ways. The stilt is vulnerable to predators that can reach it from above, and the long legs make it difficult for the stilt to take off and land. However, the stilt’s long legs are an essential part of its survival, and they allow the stilt to live in a variety of wetland habitats.

Here are some other interesting facts about the black-necked stilt’s legs:

The stilt’s legs are made up of hollow bones, which helps to reduce their weight.

The stilt’s legs have a network of blood vessels that help to keep them warm.

The stilt’s legs are covered in scales, which help to protect them from the elements.

The black-necked stilt is a fascinating bird with some amazing adaptations. Its long, thin legs are a key part of its survival, and they help the stilt to live in a variety of wetland habitats.

Most importantly, though, they make the stilt look like a Tai Chi master or ballet dancer, complementing their delicate beauty.

Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge

We had made plans to visit the Colorado Websters in May to see Zoe’s graduation ceremony, and I didn’t plan on driving that far without visiting other places, too.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t plan to do anything much because I had a doctor’s appointment right after graduation that had already been rescheduled once four months earlier.  So, we planned an extra day of travel time to Colorado in order to spend a day visiting Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge where I hoped to see the American Avocets that I didn’t see on our recent trip through California.

It didn’t take long before we saw them, either, as we found a pair on the road to the auto tour.

American Avocets Feeding and Grooming

For a while it looked like they might be the only ones we would see because the roads were flooding.  We came up to a sign warning not to cross when there was water over the road, and there was definitely water over the road.  I thought our RAV 4 was high enough that we could safely cross, but, with recent images from the news showing cars swept away by floodwaters, I decided it wasn’t worth the chance of being stuck and missing Zoe’s graduation.  

Luckily, on our way back we stopped and talked to some other birders who had stopped at the refuge office.  They were told they shouldn’t have any trouble crossing with their Subaru.  Since our RAV 4 had at least as much ground clearance as their Subaru, I decided to chance it and made it fairly easily.

I’m glad we went on because we saw American Avocets throughout the refuge.

American Avocet

We also saw American Avocets that seemed to be floating and foraging, something I’d only seen a few times before. 

Avocet Swimming

I wondered if those Avocets were feeding in deep water by choice or were forced to feed there because there weren’t many areas that weren’t flooded. 

Even more worrisome were the Avocet nests that seemed in immediate danger of being flooded.

Avocet Nesting in Deep Water

We have observed Avocets nests both on dry fields and on tussocks in wetlands in prior years, but we’ve never seen one where the water surrounding the nest was this deep. Was the water that deep when the Avocets build the nest, or had the water risen afterward and they just refused to abandon the nest? 

 

A Last Look at Bear River

We didn’t get to see the baby Grebes, Avocet chicks, or Black-necked Stilt chicks we went to Bear River to see, but we did see a lot of ducklings, like this (I think) Gadwall and her brood,  

Mother duck and brood

lots and lots of Canada Goose goslings (this is my favorite shot of far too many),

Canada Goose with Goslings

and, most exciting of all, this Long-billed Curlew chick as we were leaving the refuge.

Long-Billed Curlew chick

I had to take the shot through the windshield so the picture is blurrier than I’d like, but I’ve never seen one before so I’ll keep this shot until I get a better one.  The only reason I’m sure it is a Curlew chick is that the parent nearly flew through our windshield as this little guy ran down the road right in front of our very slow-moving car (not a survival strategy I’d suggest for other Curlew Chicks, by the way}.

I’d love to say that I got this shot of the parent as it tried to distract us,

Long-billed Curlew

but that would be a lie. I was so focused on the chick and the whole thing happened so fast with the parent flying back and forth and up and down that I couldn’t manage to get a single shot.  This shot was taken further down the road when we spotted a couple of Curlew and they, too, circled us protesting very loudly.  There might very well have been chicks nearby, but I wasn’t going to stop in the middle of the highway long enough to find them.

Since we never plan a trip just to Bear River (it’s a stop on the way to seeing Tyson’s family in Colorado), we never quite know what to expect when we get there, but we’re seldom disappointed (except the late-summer visit when there were way more mosquitoes than there were birds).

Ending this visit with the first-ever sighting of a Curlew chick made it a memorable visit.

Bear River Terns

Cinnamon Teal wasn’t the only species that was more numerous than usual at Bear River.  Though we have seen terns on previous visits, they were more active than they have ever been when we’ve been here before. Leslie wanted me to get some shots of them, but that’s a lot easier said than done, especially using the 500mm lens with doubler mounted on the window sill. 

The only way that setup would work was to set a high shutter speed and try to get shots in the distance.  I got some shots that I liked, but these first shots are heavily cropped.

I liked how this shot revealed the tern’s aeronautic design.

Forster(?) Term

I’m not sure if these are Common Terns or Forster’s Terns. but  Merlin identified it as a Forster’s Tern and since marshes are their common habitat, I am going to go with that identification.  The Audubon society notes, though, that the two are so similar that Audubon and others first considered them the same species.  It’s not surprising that I had a lot of trouble deciding what they were.

The birder in me may want to know what their name is, but when I was there their names seemed irrelevant.  I simply admired their amazing speed and their ability to catch fish 

Diving Forster Tern

by plunging full speed into the pond.

Tern in Water

Occasionally I would even get lucky and get a shot like this that seems remarkably clear despite being heavily cropped.  

Tern Mid-Flight

However, I ended up getting the best shots with the Canon EOS R5 that Leslie was using most of the time.  Even with a 600 mm lens, it’s light enough to handhold.  These last three shots required very little cropping because the terns were much closer.

I had hoped that one of the terns would be facing us while hovering, but this was the best shot I could get of one hovering, the easiest time to get a shot of them.

Tern Hovering

Except for the wing tip being out of frame, this was my favorite shot of the day. That’s probably because I’ve learned the hard way that it’s difficult to capture a closeup of a flying tern.

In fact, if your goal is simply to get a clear shot of a Forster Tern, your surest bet is to get a shot of one standing on the shore.

Tern resting on sandbar

Unfortunately, this kind of shot doesn’t capture the tern’s most remarkable trait — their speed. 

Perhaps to do that I should have included the many shots where unrecognizable parts of the terns disappear off the edges of the frame.