Birds Will Be Birds

Perhaps I should have been a zoologist. I find myself keenly interested in animals, especially wild ones, and their behaviour.

I spent some time at a lake the other day just watching the different birds. It was then that I witnessed the predatory ones try to, and sometimes succeeding in, snatching the newly hatched offsprings of other birds. It's a brutal part of nature, but it's nature.

I'm currently reading "The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs" by Steve Brusatte and I just passed the chapter about T-Rex and it's remarkable how similar they were to birds. Many of the advantages that give birds their abilities, like flight, were present already in those large beasts from the past. In fact, they are the ancestors of birds.

🦆🦖 /🦎

When you think about descendants of Dinosaurs, you might be tempted to think of crocks and gators, maybe even lizards. When, in fact, these are descendants of distant cousins of dinos. The true descendants of dinos are the aves.

It's not surprising when you take a close look at some birds and how they look and behave. Look at a rooster. It's a beaked little dinosaur and a brutal little beast if it gets pissed off. Likewise the gulls and kites that parade the sky around this lake.

I made some videos in an attempt to capture some of said behaviour. I set my phone up on a tripod in interesting corners of the park and walked away. I then remotely triggered the video when something interesting started to happen.

Not exactly National Geographic stuff, but I do have some birds being birds; pigeons trying to copulate, lol, and a squirrel burying a nut. I could see myself doing this for hours on end, which is why I wondered if I'd missed my career calling haha.

Peace & Love,

Adé