Die Haubentaucher – Hooded divers
These birds are plentiful in Bremen and this pair has been raising young for at least two years in a little lake in Huchting, a part of Bremen. This year I was there early enough to see them riding on the backs of their parents. I saw both parents carrying the babies only once, and that was on my first day there – early morning with difficult light. After that, all 3 babies were always with one parent while the other brought food. It is entirely probable that they switched off but it was impossible to tell since they are so similar. Here are a few shots, at great distance, that first morning. One baby was clearly more adventurous than the other two, taking short swims under the watchful gaze of the parent. I only post the first shot as evidence that they both shared the duty.
Later that day I was able to watch them from a much closer vantage point. I actually climbed into the water to get around the bushes visually impeding their nesting area. Here are a bunch of shots from that visit. The little one developmentally ahead of the others was always trying to nab the tiny fish from the adult.
The best seats in the house – right on the tail feathers or peaking over the shoulder.
One interesting thing about these young birds – the alarming red spot on their heads is a bare patch that deepens in color when they are very hungry. When it came time for feeding, I watched the adult carefully choosing whose turn it was. “Hey! You just got one. This is for your sibling!” Although it looked like he was teasing the baby, offering the fish then backing up, it turned out that he was just waiting for the next chick to come up from the other side. Quite often, though not always, I saw the parent choose the one with the brighter red area.
Sometimes bugs were on the menu. The chicks didn’t seem particularly enthusiastic about having the bugs jammed down their throats!
A week after I arrived, the birds were too large to hide under the feathers and I often saw all 3 out on top.
Some of my favorite pictures from that day.
Three days later, I found the grebettes (often referred to as “humbugs” after the British peppermint striped candy but which I prefer to call zebra babies) growing fast and much more active, swimming around the adult. It seemed like only one was still tentative.
The grebettes were getting bigger and so were the fish.
And still bigger…
I was perplexed about why the chicks were being given feathers to eat. I looked it up and it turns out that they need the feathers to line their stomachs against the little bones of the fish.
Usually the parent in charge of feeding would quickly drop off a fish and head back out but occasionally they seemed to just check in without food. Anthropomorphizing comes easily with these birds and here is a short series possibly showing a mother who has had it with babysitting!
Finally the extreme heat and beautiful blue skies disappeared and it was darn cold, so cold that the mama grebe had her babies on the nest again for the first time since I had arrived. Sadly for me, the nest was near but well hidden from the shore. I could mostly only see a mass of feathers under which, somewhere, was the adult grebe.
Leaving the grebe family for a moment, one day I came upon a very handsome single Grebe bathing in the Weser, the river flowing through Bremen. I didn’t have the photographic advantage of being at water level. These were taken from high up on a bluff but the bird was so beautiful that I really wanted to share these shots.
I had great weather for my last visit to the lake. The grebettes were so much bigger than the last time I had seen them. They were quite independent swimmers but I never got to see them dive.
One chick wouldn’t leave the adult’s side during my entire visit. I’m thinking that this was the one that was so tentative earlier. Poor mama but it did make for some fun pictures as you will see in the next two selections.
Anthropomorphizing once again, maybe mama was getting tired of this. (Of course, this was just part of her preening routine!)
Still getting feathers from the parents.
One of the cutest thing to watch on this day was seeing the grebettes floating along on their own bed of feathers, clearly even sound asleep sometimes.
Check out the size of their feet! It brings this song to mind! https://youtu.be/in1eK3x1PBI
Back to the lake – now that the babies were swimming mostly on their own, the adults were busy feeding them but they were also clearly enjoying swimming free in the lake. When one of them passed through the territory of the Tufted Ducks, I got shots of my two favorite birds on the lake in one frame. Here are some portraits of the adults and the babies separately.
Finally it was time to say goodbye till next year!
