Pied-billed Grebe. Photo: Steve Cronin/Audubon Photography Awards. This audio story is brought to you by BirdNote, a partner of The National Audubon Society. BirdNote episodes air daily on public radio stations nationwide…
The call of this water bird, the Pied-billed Grebe, is unusual isn’t it! Their nests are unusual too – little platforms of plant material that float on water, hidden behind vegetation. We’re with Martin Muller, an expert who loves unraveling the mysteries of Pied-billed Grebes: “Well, there’s the nest…there it is! We didn’t even see it because we were standing on the wrong side of the cattails, so if we step back a little bit…without the bird seeing…us directly staring at it, it’ll carry on.”
Audio program: “This is BirdNote”:
The birds are diving for decaying plant material, picking it up from the bottom of the lake, piling it up until it forms a floating mass. “Now this will gradually sink so they keep adding on to it… and when the first egg is laid, it can be laid in a puddle of water – it will be that flimsy a structure – and then what they do is they add on more plant material on the […]
Full transcript & credits at Audubon.org: How Grebes Build Floating Nests That Keep Their Eggs High and Dry
Watersheds on the U.S. Eastern Seaboard will be among the areas most affected by underground…
An invasive algae has wrecked huge sections of reef in Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument. Scientists…
Sardine Meadow is a key link in conservation efforts for the Sierra Nevada, north of…
UC Davis researchers insert a device that continuously collects water samples underground, providing real-time data…
Irrigated farmland in the desert of the Imperial Valley. (Photo credit: Steve Proehl, Getty Images)…
The Inspector General of the Department of Defense released some scathing reports Thursday over the…