Ash throated Flycatcher 216 Malibu Creek State Park Southern California -216
"Birds pay a price for the advantages of flight. They must commit their forelimbs almost entirely to that enterprise. As a result the bill (or “beak”) often must assume responsibility for diverse functions for which many mammals use their forelimbs—grasping, carrying, scratching, fighting, and digging.
The bill consists of the upper and lower jaws (mandibles), ensheathed in a layer of toughened skin. As tools, bills are not used just for eating food, but also for catching it. Have you ever watched a perched bird launch itself, and after a few quick flaps of its wings, seize an insect in mid-air, and then, holding its catch firmly in its bill, loop back to the same or another close-by perch? This is the “art of flycatching.”
Flycatchers have ligaments connecting the upper and lower jaws that act as springs to snap the gaped jaw shut when an insect is snared."
friendsofedgewood.org
Ash throated Flycatcher 216 Malibu Creek State Park Southern California -216
"Birds pay a price for the advantages of flight. They must commit their forelimbs almost entirely to that enterprise. As a result the bill (or “beak”) often must assume responsibility for diverse functions for which many mammals use their forelimbs—grasping, carrying, scratching, fighting, and digging.
The bill consists of the upper and lower jaws (mandibles), ensheathed in a layer of toughened skin. As tools, bills are not used just for eating food, but also for catching it. Have you ever watched a perched bird launch itself, and after a few quick flaps of its wings, seize an insect in mid-air, and then, holding its catch firmly in its bill, loop back to the same or another close-by perch? This is the “art of flycatching.”
Flycatchers have ligaments connecting the upper and lower jaws that act as springs to snap the gaped jaw shut when an insect is snared."
friendsofedgewood.org