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Love that kingfisher shot!Everybody was panting today. Muggy and hot near the coast.
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You are are correct that most adult ducks/geese are herbivores as adults. The goslings can be quite carnivorous; I have memories of squads of mallard and ring-billed duckling harvesting newly-emerged damselflies from the reeds at "Hirudinous Lake" in high summer. Among the ducks/geese, the mergansers are specialists on fish (aka, piscivores) (but with the occasional crayfish lunch as you point out). But if you translate "meat eater" into carnivore, other groups like eiders, goldeneyes, and scoters certainly focus on invertebrates as adults.Encountered this female Hooded Merganser on a little rehabbed creek in Bethlehem Pa this past weekend. The creek has wild brown trout along with some rainbow stockers and appears to be fished quite often based on the number of people I encountered. Thinking she may be culling the some of the less intelligent varieties I watched while she went under and came up with some protein.
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Dinner is served and down goes another fresh crustacean. It was early PM so the light refraction was bad at this angle on this limestone creek but the carnivorous member of the Anatidae family was working it hard and was rewarded multiple times. @Cabezon would know for sure but I think this is the only “meat eater” of the bunch.
In the spring and early summer evenings I have watched (adult) mallards turn their attention to intense midge hatches (in slow-moving water). They will actively accelerate/chase down the bugs to pick them off the surface.Mallards are well known opportunistic foragers.
I would say kestrel.View attachment 123025
New set of Martin gourds with a trail cam set up to watch them. I didn't see any Martins. Mind you it might because a pair of these guys was winging back and forth over the martin nest. I can't tell if this is a prairie or peregrine falcon vs some other, I was just setting up to get a zoomed in shot when this gut took flight...any clues for ID? I have seen peregrines around here...
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Cool, thanks Steve, that looks about right, these guys were on the smaller side. At one point a butterfly was moving and one of them pivoted to go for it, missed, didn't turn back. Bummed I didn't get a better shot,kestrels are stunning !I would say kestrel.
Steve