Birds Feeding Other Birds

^{Note: This tip comes from Tobie Schalkwyk’s free eBook - Bird Photography: Knowing Your Subjects}

IMAGES OF BIRDS FEEDING OTHER BIRDS

So, why did I not call this Quick Tip ‘Images of Birds Feeding their Chicks’?

I didn’t because that is only one end of the spectrum for the bird photographer.

Images of birds feeding their chicks are always a winner—no matter who’s looking at the photograph.

However, if you want to feel your heart cringe, look at a tiny wagtail feeding a chick twice its size from one of the cuckoo species – you just know that you’re observing something extraordinary. It’s not only a feeding; it’s a feeding with a history.

Here’s what happened.

You become filled with mixed emotions knowing that this chick’s biological mother relentlessly searched all nests in the vicinity a couple of weeks ago. It found this bird’s particular nest (already occupied by eggs) and laid its own (often much bigger) egg amongst them when the parents-to-be were away for as little as a few seconds.

The cuckoo egg then hatched first (thanks to the rules set by Mother Nature) and kicked out the unhatched eggs from the nest.

It then pushes its poor, unsuspecting surrogate parents to their limits to feed it more food than ever needed by its own chicks with much smaller tummies!

Now compare the above story to an unknowledgeable photographer simply photographing ‘a bird feeding another bird!’

Knowledge Tips

• Very few people know that when a chick falls out of a nest or loses its parents for whatever reason, other birds will react to its cry for food and feed it more often than not – even if it’s not of the same species!

• Some bird species’ social bonds are powerful, to such a degree that siblings feed each other. These are always extraordinary shots. You’ll have to know your birds well enough to distinguish juveniles from parents to do so.

• Many bird species have a dead giveaway to identify a baby/sub-adult bird: prominent yellow gape flanges (like yellow lips) where their upper and lower beaks meet.

• Even in species where adults and sub-adult birds look identical, the young ones give their babyhood away by being very noisy as they beg for food when one of the parents is nearby. A flapping or ‘shivering’ of wings often accompanies this.

Want more? If you want to learn more about bird photography, and capture beautiful shots of your own, we recommend downloading and printing out Photzy’s 10 Bird Photography Cheat Sheets (Special bonus available now!)