You're killin' me...

Maybe you know this one. Maybe you don't. But even if you do, have you ever actually seen it? Seen what you say. How a Killdeer protect its nest? Do you know what it does to protect its nest?
First of all do you see her on her nest?

Killdeer (Charadrius vociferus) on nest

Hints:

• her back is to you
• she's looking over her left while sitting on the nest
• she's near the center of the frame

Alright, so now we're going to approach and get too close to see what she'll do.

 

 There it is! The famous broken-wing distraction technique. When a predator, or in this case me in my work truck, gets too close the Killdeer flies off the nest and begins its performance. It cries out making as much noise as it can and begins to flutter around as if its wings are broken. Of course it's all a ploy to get you follow it away from its nest and just when you get too close it flies away.

I'm not skylarkin'

Honest!
To the contrary I've been quite busy and also a little bummed, enough to where I've not felt inclined to post much of anything here. I'm bummed because we lost all four of the little sparrow chicks. When we lost the first and even to a slight degree when we lost the second one I chalked it up to natural selection, as they were both on the small side despite our attention; but the last two came as a shock. I had checked on them that morning before going to work --  they were fine. A few hours later my daughter called frantically exclaiming that both birds were dead. I asked her to put my wife on and she confirmed it. My heart sank and I've been analyzing their short little lives every private moment my mind has gotten since. In the end I tell myself that "we did the best we could", "that my wife, daughter, and I aren't professional rescuers." My wife especially shouldered much of the effort, in fact she had invested so much and had seen how attached the kids had gotten to them -- my Autistic son even exclaims "baby birds" to this day when he sees pictures of them, that she asked me not to do that again. I know... I know... Nobody can say that those little birds weren't loved.

I've been busy, that too is true. We've been busy at work -- construction escorts every weekday eight hours or better. I've been busy with Scouts, CSMR, and of course family is always busy. And I continue to press on through school, in fact my first semester back is almost at an end. I am overjoyed to announce after having recently met with a counselor that all the past credits that I've earned over the years at the community college I attend still count! This means that I am closer to transfer to state college and finishing a degree in organismal biology. I did say closer. I have a lot of math to finish and specific lower division courses to do, but 75% of general education classes are done and when I do transfer I'm leaving with a double associates of science in both biological sciences and fire science. Oh, and I guess I haven't mentioned this yet -- the reason for going back to school. I have have had a goal since before I started this blog of becoming an airport wildlife biologist and working for either USDA or directly for an airport with biologist on staff like Portland.