View allAll Photos Tagged Substrate
Dust bathing (also called sand bathing) is an animal behavior characterized by rolling or moving around in dust, dry earth or sand, with the likely purpose of removing parasites from fur, feathers or skin. Dust bathing is a maintenance behavior performed by a wide range of mammalian and avian species. For some animals, dust baths are necessary to maintain healthy feathers, skin, or fur, similar to bathing in water or wallowing in mud. In some mammals, dust bathing may be a way of transmitting chemical signals (or pheromones) to the ground which marks an individual's territory.
Birds crouch close to the ground while taking a dust bath, vigorously wriggling their bodies and flapping their wings. This disperses loose substrate into the air. The birds spread one or both wings which allows the falling substrate to fall between the feathers and reach the skin. The dust bath is often followed by thorough shaking to further ruffle the feathers which may be accompanied with preening using the bill.
Taken at Masirah Island, Oman.
Have a peaceful weekend my dear Flickr friends.
Thank you so much for dropping by my photostream.
FACTS:
Delicately built small plover with bright yellow eyerings. Note dull pinkish legs and large white forehead patch (in adults). Plumage much like bulkier Ringed Plover, but white eyebrow continues unbroken across forehead. In flight shows narrow, indistinct whitish wing stripe. Breeds on stony substrates around lakes, gravel pits, and along rivers; migrants occur in wide variety of fresh and brackish wetland habitats, but rarely out on open tidal areas. Clipped “peu” call quite distinct from call of similar Common Ringed Plover.
(eBird)
DFD_4676
Eunota togata globicollis -- male
This species blends into the substrate and when they stand still are almost invisible.
Taken under a cloudy sky
Wren Troglodytes Troglodytes
The Eurasian wren (Troglodytes troglodytes) is a very small bird, and the only member of the wren family Troglodytidae found in Eurasia and Africa (Maghreb). In Anglophone Europe, it is commonly known simply as the wren.
The scientific name is taken from the Greek word troglodytes (from trogle a hole, and dyein to creep), meaning cave-dweller and refers to its habit of disappearing into cavities or crevices whilst hunting arthropods or to roost.
This small, stump-tailed wren is almost as familiar in Europe as the robin. It is mouse-like, easily lost sight of when it is hunting for food, but is found everywhere from the tops of the highest moors to the sea coast.
In most of northern Europe and Asia, it nests mostly in coniferous forests, where it is often identified by its long and exuberant song. Although it is an insectivore, it can remain in moderately cold and even snowy climates by foraging for insects on substrates such as bark and fallen logs.
Its movements as it creeps or climbs are incessant rather than rapid; its short flights swift and direct but not sustained, its tiny round wings whirring as it flies from bush to bush.
It is a bird of the uplands even in winter, vanishing into the heather when snow lies thick above, a troglodyte indeed. It frequents gardens and farms, but it is quite as abundant in thick woods and in reed-beds.
At night, usually in winter, it often roosts, true to its scientific name, in dark retreats, snug holes and even old nests. In hard weather, it may do so in parties, consisting of either the family or of many individuals gathered together for warmth.
The male wren builds several nests, up to 6 or 7. These are called cock nests but are never lined until the female chooses one to use.
The normal round nest of grass, moss, lichens or leaves is tucked into a hole in a wall, tree trunk, crack in a rock or corner of a building, but it is often built in bushes, overhanging boughs or the litter which accumulates in branches washed by floods.
In European folklore, the wren is the king of the birds, according to a fable attributed to Aesop by Plutarch, when the eagle and the wren strove to fly the highest, the wren rested on the eagle's back, and when the eagle tired, the wren flew out above him. Thus, Plutarch implied, the wren proved that cleverness is better than strength. The wren's majesty is recognized in such stories as the Grimm Brothers' The Willow-Wren and the Bear. Aristotle and Plutarch called the wren basileus (king) and basiliskos (little king).
In German, the wren is called Zaunkönig (king of the fence). An old German name was “Schneekönig” (snow king), and in Dutch, it is “winterkoning” (winter king), which all refer to king. In Japan, the wren is labelled king of the winds, and the myth of The Wren Among the Hawks sees the wren successfully hunt a boar that the hawks could not, by flying into its ear and driving it mad.
It was a sacred bird to the druids, who considered it king of all birds and used its musical notes for divination. The shape-shifting Fairy Queen took the form of a wren, known as Jenny Wren in nursery rhymes. A wren's feather was thought to be a charm against disaster or drowning.
Population:
UK breeding:
8,600,000 territories
Cultivated in SGK = substrate glass culture.
Unfortunately, some flowers are already through with the bloom.
Wren Troglodytes Troglodytes
The Eurasian wren (Troglodytes troglodytes) is a very small bird, and the only member of the wren family Troglodytidae found in Eurasia and Africa (Maghreb). In Anglophone Europe, it is commonly known simply as the wren.
The scientific name is taken from the Greek word troglodytes (from trogle a hole, and dyein to creep), meaning cave-dweller and refers to its habit of disappearing into cavities or crevices whilst hunting arthropods or to roost.
This small, stump-tailed wren is almost as familiar in Europe as the robin. It is mouse-like, easily lost sight of when it is hunting for food, but is found everywhere from the tops of the highest moors to the sea coast.
In most of northern Europe and Asia, it nests mostly in coniferous forests, where it is often identified by its long and exuberant song. Although it is an insectivore, it can remain in moderately cold and even snowy climates by foraging for insects on substrates such as bark and fallen logs.
Its movements as it creeps or climbs are incessant rather than rapid; its short flights swift and direct but not sustained, its tiny round wings whirring as it flies from bush to bush.
It is a bird of the uplands even in winter, vanishing into the heather when snow lies thick above, a troglodyte indeed. It frequents gardens and farms, but it is quite as abundant in thick woods and in reed-beds.
At night, usually in winter, it often roosts, true to its scientific name, in dark retreats, snug holes and even old nests. In hard weather, it may do so in parties, consisting of either the family or of many individuals gathered together for warmth.
The male wren builds several nests, up to 6 or 7. These are called cock nests but are never lined until the female chooses one to use.
The normal round nest of grass, moss, lichens or leaves is tucked into a hole in a wall, tree trunk, crack in a rock or corner of a building, but it is often built in bushes, overhanging boughs or the litter which accumulates in branches washed by floods.
In European folklore, the wren is the king of the birds, according to a fable attributed to Aesop by Plutarch, when the eagle and the wren strove to fly the highest, the wren rested on the eagle's back, and when the eagle tired, the wren flew out above him. Thus, Plutarch implied, the wren proved that cleverness is better than strength. The wren's majesty is recognized in such stories as the Grimm Brothers' The Willow-Wren and the Bear. Aristotle and Plutarch called the wren basileus (king) and basiliskos (little king).
In German, the wren is called Zaunkönig (king of the fence). An old German name was “Schneekönig” (snow king), and in Dutch, it is “winterkoning” (winter king), which all refer to king. In Japan, the wren is labelled king of the winds, and the myth of The Wren Among the Hawks sees the wren successfully hunt a boar that the hawks could not, by flying into its ear and driving it mad.
It was a sacred bird to the druids, who considered it king of all birds and used its musical notes for divination. The shape-shifting Fairy Queen took the form of a wren, known as Jenny Wren in nursery rhymes. A wren's feather was thought to be a charm against disaster or drowning.
Population:
UK breeding:
8,600,000 territories
This small to medium sized saprobic fungus fruits in dense clusters during winter on both exotic and indigenous fallen or standing wood. Has a sticky pale yellow to rosy-orange brown cap darker in the centae; with a distinctively velvety stem that darkens from the base upward; without a ring and having attached, close gills.
Common name: Velvet foot; Winter mushroom.
Found: Podocarp Forest
Substrate: Wood
Spore: WhiteHeight: 40 mm
Width: 30 mm
Season: Autumn to early winter
Edible: Yes, commercially cultivated
The Bar-tailed Godwit is a large wading bird recognised by its long, slightly upturned bill and streaked brown plumage. In breeding condition, it develops a rich reddish-orange colour on the underparts, especially in males. It inhabits coastal mudflats, estuaries, and sandy shores, where it feeds on worms, molluscs, and crustaceans by probing deep into the substrate. This species is renowned for its extraordinary long-distance migrations, with some populations travelling non-stop between Arctic breeding grounds and wintering areas as far as Australia and New Zealand.
This old gnarly oak atop the rocks above the waterfalls fascinates me. Such determination to survive on a meagre substrate.
The dunes' dark bands are often made up of magnetite particulate washed downstream from the Sangre De Cristo mountains after strong storms. While the lighter material arrives from the San Luis Valley to the southwest on prevailing winds. All that substrate gets carried by updrafts to the dune ridges and creates the intricate zebra-like stripe pattern.