View allAll Photos Tagged Behaviour
A pair of tree swallows, a male and a female, were starting a home in the nest box pictured here. While photographing their activity, I anticipated one of them landing on the box and the other nearby. However, they both flew on by and landed on the barbed wire, one on either side of the box.
"At not one point did I say I was innocent darling...."
Model: Stella Fiorani
Photographer: Stella Fiorani
Location: Sunny's Photo Studio
maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Sunny%20Photo%20Studio/128...
Backdrop "Devilish in Black"
Pose customized in Black Dragon
Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus). Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge - Visitor Center. New Mexico, USA.
0287
That is the question!
Any ideas?
Unfortunately the Robins spotted me and flew off.
These two took me by surprise, therefore I only managed a quick snap shot.
Behaviour:
White-tailed eagles spend much of their day perched on trees or crags, and may often not move for hours. Perhaps up to 90% of a day may be spent perched, especially if weather is poor. Also, they will alternate periods of soaring with perching, especially flying over water or well-watered areas, but do considerably less soaring on average than do golden eagles. Pairs regularly roost together, often near to their nest, either on a crag or tree or crevices, overhung ledges or small isolated trees on a crag.
White-tailed Eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla) Apetlon, Burgenland Austria_7512
A line of elephants striking quite the impressive pose. Behaviour wise, probably a nice balance between inquisitiveness and being protective of their herd.
The behaviour of many species of fantail has not been studied, but overall the family is highly uniform in its habits. Anecdotal observations of less studied species suggest a high degree of similarity with the better studied species. Fantails are highly active birds, with several of the smaller species continuously on the move; even when perched they continue to rock back and forth, spin 180° on the spot, wag their tail from side to side or fan and unfan it. In flight they are highly agile and undertake highly aerobatic and intricate looping flights while using their fanned tail to catch insects in flight.
One cooperative behaviour you may see honey bees do is clump together at the entrance to a hive in an attempt to regulate the temperature or humidity within the hive. That is typically done on hot and/or humid days. The clumping is called bearding in the bee-keeping parlance.
This image was taken on a very cool morning, so heat wasn't an issue. There was lots of dew, so maybe humidity was a problem.
In trying to figure out what I was seeing, I checked out a few websites. The Honey Bee Suite site seemed to offer the best explanation: "Once the bees begin to finish their work in late summer, you are more apt to see bearding, especially in large colonies. This occurs because the cells are already full of nectar, but summer dearth means flowers are scarce, so no new cells are needed. Simply put, the bees are left with nothing to do.
Too many bees in the hive block air flow, which slows down the drying of nectar, so the bees hang around outside. New beekeepers often misread this behavior as preparation for swarming, but it has nothing to do with swarming. In fact, many of these bees will die at the ends of their natural adult lives of four-to-six weeks, and most will not be replaced in order to bring the colony down to a manageable winter population.
Then too, bearding often increases after the beekeeper removes honey supers, thus forcing the bees into a smaller space. Since there isn’t enough room indoors, the bees stay outside, just doing their thing."
In this case, two hives were exhibiting the behaviour, and both looked to have been downsized recently, meaning the extra summer storage areas for honey and pollen (supers) have been removed by the bee keeper. So, perhaps I happened to show up when there was simply no room in the hive and all these bees were just hanging out at the entrance.
If anyone knows of other explanations for this behaviour, please share your knowledge.
Walking through the busy streets in Chichester town centre, I came across this canine character. A good tip on dog behaviour, don't stare at them unless you want them to bark and scare the living day lights out of you.
Think it was a Hungarian Vizsla. Gorgeous dog which had to be photographed.
© Leanne Boulton, All Rights Reserved
Archie was perched on the arm of the chair watching a fly buzzing around the room. Light was streaming in through the window and casting reflections that made a beam of light effect and I just had to reach for my camera! I quickly swapped to my telephoto lens so I didn't get too close and disturb his pose. Enjoy!
I photographed this Bald Eagle as the Male & Female were exchanging turns on the nest. The Eagle on the nest called for relief and the other Eagle circled several times before landing on the nest. Very interesting to watch this behaviour.
Snapped this fella ( a polecat ) in a bit of autumnal sunshine, coming out of his home in a drystone wall, he gave me the look; good job he wasn't the size of a dog or I might have been in trouble, lol. Taken in Wales a while back. Polecat - Mustella putorius
A group of visitors momentarily framed as the exhibit, pressed up against glass that inverts the usual roles of observer and observed. The image plays on the quiet absurdity of the zoo experience, where containment and curiosity work both ways. For a moment, the animals are elsewhere.
When our holiday cottage in Norfolk mentioned Little Owls, I was sold. These were in a disused bit of the farm 50 metres away, and I didn't waste any before asking the farmer if I could setup a popup hide. So, holiday sorted. On this particular day, the owls had perched quite close to the hide and I had to crawl to it through stinging nettles (cue sleepless nights with stinging legs). It did however allow for some amazing Little Owl watching. Including this from an adult, who was overheating and therefore opening its mouth and panting to try and cool down.
Two naturally white subjects, the white inchworm and the white flower on a chili plant for Smile on Saurday theme 'Natural White'.
A 'striped insect' for Macro Mondays theme 'Pick Two'.
Having spent several days playing around with other combinations for Pick Two (not overly happy with anything), I went into my greenhouse yesterday to do some watering and found this tiny caterpillar on one of my chili plants when I was checking for aphids. Moving the plant to a more photogenic location resulted in the caterpillar adopting this pose by standing on its prolegs at the posterior end and holding motionless long enough for a focus stack. I suspect this is a type of inchworm - larva of the Geometridae family of moths. I have seen inchworms perform this behaviour before in an attempt to fool a predator into thinking the inchworm is a small twig - but I have never seen a white one before, and it would have to be a pretty poor predator that would think this was a twig!
This was shot with a Raynox DCR-250 mounted on my macro lens, so it wasn't until I looked closely when processing that I realised the caterpillar had tiny stripes - theme sorted for this week!
The title was inspired by a 1965 recording by the McCoys: www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcHqUGZ6leI
No caterpillars were harmed in the making of this photograph.
Masked Lapwing portrait......
The masked lapwing (Vanellus miles) is a large, common and conspicuous bird native to Australia (particularly the northern and eastern parts of the continent), New Zealand and New Guinea. It spends most of its time on the ground searching for food such as insects and worms, and has several distinctive calls. It is common in Australian fields and open land, and is known for its defensive swooping behaviour during the nesting season.
A White-faced Ibis preens with its long bill. The feathers of this species show many colours with a metallic sheen when seen in the right light. I witnessed this behaviour at the 68 St Wetlands in the northeastern part of the major city of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
At a different time of the day, I got this photo of, I believe, the same great grey owl exhibiting the same behaviour of flying from post to post, or down into the grass for a possible meal. In this case I caught the pre-launch hunch in profile. The owl looks massive, but they actually have scrawny bodies inside that big ball of feathers.
The light was quite dim, so the ISO was high (8000). Thank goodness for noise reduction software!
Muppet preens the new feathers on her baby. This was one of those special moments, behaviour I have not noticed before. This is Muppet's first youngster.
'CARE' for Flickr Friday.
Lifer! I used to see these high in the forest canopy during my BC years, but there was never a photo op... until last month, here on the Saskatchewan prairie. We are at the easternmost extent of this species' migratory range, and one showed up at a friend's feeder. I received an early morning phone call, rushed over, and was able to shoot through an open window.
Lifers - by which I mean photo-lifers - are hard to come by these days. I've photographed most species that breed here or pass through in migration. Most days I'm out there trying to improve on earlier shots or capture some interesting behaviour. Once in a while, though, I get lucky; this is my second lifer of Spring 2024. Will there be a third? I am optimistic. And that comment leads to one of my favourite quotes:
"The reason for optimism lies in the biological fact that it keeps you happy and busy, whereas pessimism just leads to lying around and bitching."
- Robert Anton Wilson
I tried the latter many years ago and it didn't work, so I'll just stick with the former and ride it until my ride ends.
Photographed just outside village limits, in the Rural Municipality of Val Marie, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2024 James R. Page - all rights reserved.
...after you smell your own bottom.
Little Africa was grooming herself and was at the bathroom end when she got a whiff of, well herself.
"The flehmen response is an animal behavior in which the animal curls back the upper lip. This exposes the front teeth and gums of the animal. This is actually a means through which the pheromones and certain scents are transferred into the vomeronasal organ."
After 4 bird shots with interesting behaviour and/or action, this one is definitely second tier. But it's my first decent Say's Phoebe shot, and my first from Grasslands National Park - we don't see them often in my area. I was able to walk right up to this bird as it perched on top of a collapsing old ranch building on the former Larson holdings (Walt Larson was the first local rancher to agree to sell when Parks Canada began acquiring land for the new park in the 1980s, always on a willing buyer, willing seller basis).
That's nothing but sky in the background, btw. I promised to end this series of "birds on blue" with a water background, and that's coming right up, probably later today, a rare double upload day for me.
Photographed in Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan (Canada). Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission ©2022 James R. Page - all rights reserved.
These big black-browed albatrosses are know as long-distance fliers, soaring effortlessly over the ocean in the search of food. But when they are sitting on a nest, as this one is, they will routinely tuck their bills into their back feathers and rest for a while.
Parents will take turns on the nest while the other heads out to feed and gather food for the chick (if the egg has hatched).
Mallotus villosus, know in eastern Canada as capelin, breed on the stony beaches of Newfoundland each summer. They 'roll' up onto the beaches on the incoming waves in massive numbers to lay their eggs, after which they catch the next wave back into the ocean.
However, some do get stranded too high on the beach. The fish will then flip and flop to try getting back down to where the water is. Some fail. There are three basic techniques they seem to use. Some will twist/roll. Others employ a 'moonwalk' technique where they undulate their bodies, tail first, down the beach. They will also pivot on their nose, as shown in this image.
The fish prefer to breed on beaches with smaller gravel, like this one. All the little whitish/brownish balls you see, that looks almost like sand, are eggs, but the individual in the photo is a male so it only contributed the milk that contains the spermatozoa that fertilizes the eggs. The males develop stronger colours on their back and enlarged pelvic fins. Females are more silver/white on the sides and will have a swollen abdomen due to all the eggs. If conditions are not right, they will also breed off-shore.
The photo isn't the best, but does illustrate most of the points noted above.
for this young bull elephant (loxodonta africana) the atmosphere of the sunset must have been really exciting....
Unlike us, nature has no malice or shame. Among other things there is no relationship between this physical state and what we can think.
the young elephant is simply happy!
chobe riverfront,chobe national park, Botswana
canon 5DIII+100/400isII iso320 F5.6 1/800
"Complexity characterises the behaviour of a system or model whose components interact in multiple ways and follow local rules, leading to non-linearity, randomness, collective dynamics, hierarchy, and emergence.
The term is generally used to characterize something with many parts where those parts interact with each other in multiple ways, culminating in a higher order of emergence greater than the sum of its parts. The study of these complex linkages at various scales is the main goal of complex systems theory.
The intuitive criterion of complexity can be formulated as follows: a system would be more complex if more parts could be distinguished, and if more connections between them existed." (WP)
"La complexité caractérise le comportement d'un système ou d'un modèle dont les composants interagissent de multiples manières et suivent des règles locales, conduisant à la non-linéarité, au hasard, à la dynamique collective, à la hiérarchie et à l'émergence.
Le terme est généralement utilisé pour caractériser quelque chose comportant de nombreuses parties, où ces parties interagissent les unes avec les autres de multiples manières, aboutissant à un ordre d'émergence supérieur supérieur à la somme de ses parties. L’étude de ces liens complexes à différentes échelles constitue l’objectif principal de la théorie des systèmes complexes.
Le critère intuitif de complexité peut être formulé ainsi : un système serait plus complexe si plus de parties pouvaient être distinguées et s'il existait plus de connexions entre elles. » (WP)
The Flehmen response (also called the Flehmen position, Flehmen reaction, flehming, or flehmening) is a behaviour whereby an animal curls back its upper lips exposing its front teeth, inhales with the nostrils usually closed and then often holds this position for several seconds.
It may be performed over a site or a substance of particular interest to the animal (e.g. urine or faeces) or may be performed with the neck stretched and the head held high in the air.
Flehmen is performed by a wide range of mammals including ungulates and felids.
The behaviour facilitates the transfer of pheromones and other scents into the vomeronasal organ located above the roof of the mouth via a duct which exits just behind the front teeth of the animal.
Kwazulu Natal, South Africa
syncerus caffer
kafferbuffel of Afrikaanse buffel
buffle d'Afrique ou buffle noir des savanes
Afrikanischer Büffel
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The Australian Galah is one of the most abundant species of Parrot - the noisy screeching and comical behaviour is a pleasure to view!
These diminutive birds are such charming little characters, with their striking markings and busy behaviour. It's always a pleasure to catch up with one, like this little fella at Lower Sabie in the Kruger National Park, South Africa.
Thanks for viewing, and for any faves or comments - they're always very much appreciated.
On a very windy day on an Albertan wetland, getting lined up is a bit more challenging as the bird is reacting to strong gusts, and so is the camera and the photographer. The black-necked stilt was keeping an even level of flight so I was able to track it. I was also back a bit further than this crop shows.
It is fun to watch these birds interact. They will associate in small, loose colonies, but it can take a few chases and squabbles to sort out relationships and territories.
I've no idea what's going on in this pic, other than the awesome behaviour of nature and what's going on inside the camera — particularly the strobe-like artefacts, but mostly the bounce!
a drop of rainwater from a drainpipe into a water butt outside Rob's
They were too far away for a good picture however, I took this shot anyway because of the male's behaviour charging females at several occasions while I was there. Females either ignored him or pushed him away. I have never seen this before even though I observed them a lot in the past. I don't think it is courting time in mid-January. It was just bizarre.