It’s been some time since my final entry into the ongoing “Wildlife on a Maine Pond” series, nevertheless it’s not for lack of thrilling wildlife exercise. This entry will characteristic the debut of the animal I crossed my fingers for: child loons.
A few month after constructing their nest and laying the everyday clutch of two eggs, the breeding pair of loons that my dad and I’ve adopted for years turned mother and father. Whereas that is removed from the primary time we’ve seen loon chicks, it by no means will get previous seeing new life clumsily swim round, chirping for meals, and napping on a dad or mum’s again.
Photographing the newborn loons is as difficult as it’s rewarding, because the fluffy infants are tiny — little grey specks coming up and down within the water. When photographing loon chicks from a secure distance, as one all the time ought to, they’re comparatively small within the body. As I’ve mentioned quite a few instances on this collection, the two-times crop issue of a Micro 4 Thirds digital camera is tremendous useful for wildlife pictures, particularly when the topic is as small as a child fowl.
There’s additionally an emotional element to photographing child loons. They’re lovable, and I like loons. However there’s the fixed risk of peril. As quickly because the chicks hatch, they’re swimming. They’ll’t dive they usually can’t fly, so they’re, virtually actually, sitting geese.
The dynamics of loon survival charges stay an space of intense focus. Nonetheless, usually, it’s virtually a coin flip {that a} loon chick will survive into adolescence and have the ability to migrate within the fall. And with two loon chicks, the chances that they each make it’s about one in 4. I’ve seen it occur, however not usually.
So every morning we put the kayaks in and head onto the water, there’s a palpable nervousness about whether or not the loon chicks will nonetheless be there. And when photographing them, particularly when their mother and father aren’t proper subsequent to them, a frequent incidence, I dread a grizzled snapping turtle grabbing the newborn from under or a fowl of prey hanging from above.
Child loons, weighing little greater than 140-150 grams (about 5 ounces) at start, face a grim, harsh actuality, and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. Turtles and eagles should eat, too, however I do all the time hope they discover one thing, something else for sustenance.
Final week, it appeared that each loon chicks had met a devastating destiny. They have been nowhere to be discovered.
I attempted to be optimistic. There have been uncommon events through the years after we haven’t seen the loons on a specific day, as they’ve been tucked away within the weeds and didn’t come out within the morning. However that’s not the almost certainly rationalization for a silent, empty pond.
Nevertheless, thankfully, the unlikeliest proved the true one. The loons are nonetheless thriving and searching good.
They develop so quick. We photographed them within the first few days of their lives when the newly hatched chicks have been coated in darkish, downy feathers with white bellies.
Their eyes are nonetheless brown, a far cry from the good pink of their mother and father. The chicks have little darkish toes, and stunted wings that appear like somebody threw them on on the final minute, like unfinished, wonky little clay sculptures of a fowl quite than a dwelling, respiration fowl.
However make no mistake, these clumsy critters, whereas defenseless, don’t lack expertise. As talked about, they swim as quickly as they’re born. Overlook studying how they’re born understanding. In addition they produce other spectacular instincts from day zero, like preening and drying their wings.
One of many siblings appeared extra superior than the opposite and was the primary to take its first dives. Though they normally can’t dive till they’re a minimum of per week previous, which is spectacular in its personal proper, one of many infants began plunking beneath the floor after just some days.
After a couple of weeks, they start to molt, sporting a recent, lighter brown coat. They then get considerably greater, can swallow bigger fish, and even swim underwater for some time. That is about the place the chicks at the moment are, as they rejoice their one-month birthday this weekend, now a lot bigger, longer, and browner.
They’re not out of the woods but, nevertheless it’s onerous to specific the reduction that washed over me when the newborn loon’s unusual absence was simply an aberration.
Nature can be brutal and unforgiving. It’s a part of what makes the wild world so compelling, lovely, and generally painful. However this yr’s infants are nonetheless within the combat, and I’ve been lucky sufficient to observe them develop, silently cheering them on from a distance.
Many nature and wildlife photographers can empathize with my feelings concerning the loon chicks. As passionate observers, we type an intense (but always respectful and hands-off) bond with wildlife. After you watch one thing take its first steps, paddle, or flight, it’s unattainable to not care what occurs to them. In the future at a time, little loons.
Picture credit: Pictures by Jeremy Grey and Bruce Grey
