From the Contact Station July 2019

It’s the cute season again

It is hard to stop yourself from gushing over our baby birds this time of year. Watching them closely minded by parents as they move around in the wetlands just brings a smile to your face. They do grow fast though. They are quite distinct in plumage, such as it is, when first leaving the nest, but you can see changes in looks and behavior over days, if you can spot them. See if you can age our growing birds on your next visit to the refuge.

Take the American Coot, Fulica americana, the adults are black-headed with slate-gray upper parts and ashy-gray underparts with a bright white bill and shield. Their nests are built in stands of emergent vegetation along margins of ponds and close to open water. Since they are built over water on floating platforms, nest maintenance is a big job for the parents as floating vegetation tends to deteriorate quickly and sink. On average coots will lay 8 to 12 eggs and incubation is a little over 3 weeks. Egg predation does take a big toll on all our wetlands birds so it is not likely you will see a mother and 12 chicks.

Hatchling coots are gaudily colored (first photo). Downy young are uniformly black with flame-scarlet to orange on forehead and chin, a reddish bare crown with blue over the eyes and scarlet bill with black tip. A 6-hour-old coot is quite buoyant and capable of climbing out of its nest and swimming to cover. Usually leaving the nest within a day of hatching, they follow a parent, which initially feeds them and then assists their growing young in foraging. The brilliant head colorations and facial down ornamentation apparently attract and stimulate parent birds to feed begging young, which display these parts conspicuously. Since earliest and latest hatchlings in a clutch can be separated in age by as much as a week, older chicks often leave the nest with one parent, usually the female, while the other parent takes over the major share of responsibility for defending and incubating unhatched eggs. The young brood moves about their territory remaining close to parents and emergent vegetation. They start life begging from the parents, but in the first month learn to forage by pecking. In the second month, they learn to dive for food with less pecking and less dependence on the adults to feed them. At the same time, chicks begin spending more time at greater distances from their parents and vegetation cover.

When the first eggs start hatching, a brood nest is built. The older, more active young return to it at night to be brooded by one parent while the other parent continues to incubate and brood newly hatched chicks on the egg nest.

Juvenile plumage (second photo) is acquired by a complete postnatal molt and colored body plumes are lost. The bill becomes bright red-orange by 15 days. At 25 days, two white lateral patches appear at the water line of the breast extending to the throat and head in two more days. The result is a striking contrast to the darker appearance of younger birds. The bill becomes paler orange. The breast, throat, neck, cheek, and flanks are all feathered by four weeks. Except for grayish bills and feet and leg colors, 80-day old coots resemble adults in all respects. The young are seldom fed by parents after 28 days of age and feed in brood flocks by 36 days.

Have fun watching our coots and see if you can determine their age. Don’t be surprised if there are younger birds later in the summer because some pairs may re-nest with a second brood or if there is a failure to the first brood.

Another platform nester, the Pied-billed Grebe, Podilymbus Podiceps, picks its nest site based on water depth and emergent vegetation density. The number of eggs laid can range between two to ten. Both parents participate in rearing activities. During the day, they may both leave the nest, but they will cover it completely with nest materials. Eggs are incubated for a little over three weeks.

Newly hatched grebes can drown if they haven’t dried sufficiently and are too long in water. But they can leave the nest soon after hatching; chicks are carried on the adult’s back and brooded extensively during their first week. They climb onto the back of the adult beside or over the adult’s tail. On nest or the adult’s back, chicks move by pushing with their feet, gliding on their breast and belly. During the first few days, young sleep except during feeding. On the first day, the adult sometimes dabs feathers and insects in water before offering them to chicks. By the second week, the chick can turn an offered fish around to swallow it headfirst (see photos). By the second week, they may be seen chasing live fishes and insects, but it takes several days to gain the skills to catch anything. Riding on the adult’s back can continue until the young are independent, from 28 to 68 days old. Time spent in the water gradually increases from 10 min per day to day and night by week four. Most of the first three weeks are spent on or near the initial platform. The family will make trips away from platform in the third week.

Hatchlings are covered with short and thin down except on their lores. Their back and sides are black, with four longitudinal white stripes. Their crown has two V-shaped white lines while the throat and sides of head to the level of eyes are white. You might see cinnamon-rufous head-markings. Individual chicks may be recognized by variations in this patterning. By day seven, the striped pattern becomes diffuse as second down feathers begin to grow. The striped pattern starts to diminish with further feather growth and the juvenile plumage is fully developed by seven weeks. At this stage, the upper mandible is dark brown or dark yellow-brown while the lower mandible is a pink-buff.

The average clutch for Virginia Rails, Rallus limicola, is around eight or nine eggs. Incubation is about nineteen days. Both parents incubate. Chicks are strong enough to walk within eleven hours of hatching. And by the end of the first day, they are running down the nest ramp, drinking, defecating, and swimming. They look like little black puff balls on long, skinny sticks as they walk the muddy edges. Usually, the chicks get feeding help for a few days from the parents and will follow them around, but they can also feed on their own in seven days. They will brood together on the breeding territory for about a month. New birds have been seen to fly from four to seven weeks after hatching, when they have adult body proportions and body weight.

A big Thank you to refuge photographers Scott Carpenter (American Coots), Fred Kerr (Pied-billed Grebe) and Angie Vogel (Virginia Rail) for sharing their wonderful photographs with us.