Thursday, August 9, 2012

Odd Man Out


The two most dominant osprey chicks hang together a lot of the time, sitting in a favored sycamore tree close to the nest (in case mom or dad come home with a fish).  The runt usually sits by itself in the nest.

The other day, the runt got tired of sitting alone and wanted to perch with it's siblings so it flew over to the tree and came in as though it was going to land.  The other two didn't even flinch, in fact, they didn't even look at it, but ignored it as if thinking, "Maybe if I ignore him, he'll go away."


As it flew closer, there was still no reaction or recognition on the part of the two. It was as though it was not even there.


Many species of birds will bump another bird off a perch simply by descending on it like it is going to land, which causes the perched bird to yield the perch and fly off.  That didn't happen here.  As it dropped down to the branch, neither moved, so it took back to the air again.


It was only at this point that the two on the branch finally acted like there was another bird around and looked up at it's sibling. 


They continued to watch it while it circled around and returned to the nest box. It just struck me as comical the way they now seemed keenly interested in what it was doing.

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