JUNE MONTHLY CHALLENGE — BABY WILD ANIMALS
The Chicks of the King of the Fence are About to Break Free
A tiny but mighty bird on the edge of becoming an adult
I didn’t have much faith in my birding skills. I am not able to recognize the singing of a bird or tell you its species. And as I walked through the forest their songs were sounding from above. High above me in the tree tops.
But I was determined to get at least one photograph of a bird this day. I walked deeper and deeper into the forest when all of a sudden I heard a distinctive bird singing in a high-pitched voice. It wasn’t just the sound standing out to me but the bird also appeared to be much lower than all the others.
I walked towards a few bushes standing in front of me. This is where I located the sound. That was the easy part of bird watching. Now comes the tricky one. Find the bird and get it in front of my lens.
As I stepped closer I could identify one high voice sitting somewhere on a nearby tree communicating with the chirping of chicks somewhere below.
Now I knew, there must be a nest and even if the mother bird keeps on escaping my eyes, I should be able to capture one of the chicks.
I soon spotted them hopping around on the branches in the undergrowth. But the bushes were so thick I had real trouble shooting through the green. My camera didn’t understand me. She didn’t know what to focus on.
Eventually, I spotted a pile of fallen branches and identified them as their nest. Somewhere in between must be the warm and safe home of these tiny birds.
“In order to see birds it is necessary to become a part of the silence.” — Robert Lynd
And not long after I got to see one of the chicks sitting on a branch almost clear in a shot from me. They are indeed tiny. I haven’t seen their mom yet but these birds remind me of the Eurasian wren.
In German, this bird is called “the king of the fence” and while German isn’t the most beautiful language in the world, I do think they found a pretty name for this tiny but mighty bird.
I kept on moving around the bushes. By now I had spotted two chicks, possibly the only two survivors from 4 to 5 eggs and these two were almost ready to fly off on their own.
The siblings were hopping around on the branches, moving in and out of the safe home while constantly chirping, asking for more food.
One of them seemed a bit shyer, a little less loud in his voice, and a little more concerned about my presence. Surely the one I struggled more to get on camera.
On the other hand, his brother (or sister) wasn’t having any of it. He didn’t listen to his sibling to remain quiet and stay hidden. He went all out announcing his state of hunger to the animal world of the forest.
The brother decided to give up eventually and remained low in the undergrowth.
He didn’t hop around as much as his brother and gave me a chance to get several pictures at once.
There she was. Mom. I hear her too. She was coming from far announcing her arrival with loud singing.
Mom was even more concerned about my presence and as she was attempting to fly to the nest, did a sharp turn landing on a nearby tree. The shy sibling must be the smarter one because he started to hop towards the end of the bushes opposite me.
Mom spotted him, quickly flew towards him, dropped off food, and flew off again. All of this happened with a line of branches in between us and within a split second, I had no chance to document it.
But it didn’t happen out of the eyesight of his loud brother who wasn’t amused at all. He had announced for so long he was starving and now had to watch how his sibling got fed and he didn’t.
Guess what. He announced his anger loud and clear.
Time for me to move off their property and let them gain the last bit of strength they need in order to push those wings and fly off on their own.
I hope you enjoyed watching these chicks in the undergrowth as much as I did.
“The birds of hope are everywhere, listen to them sing.” — Terri Guillemets
Thank you Randy Runtsch for the writing prompt.
This was my first response to the June challenge:
And if you are interested in wildlife, here are more stories:
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