Moorhen Family

This morning I visited a small pond which is covered in Lily pads and home to a pair of Moorhens and their brood of 5 youngsters.

It was a lovely morning, the pond was bathed in bright sunshine and the youngsters seemed to enjoying themselves exploring their surroundings...

The parents while still keeping a watchful eye on the little ones were busy collecting materials for a new nest site, right in the middle of the pond...

New Life

Yesterday, feeling a lot better after the cold from hell, I decided to visit a couple of locations close to home and take in some sunshine on what was the warmest day of the year so far...

First stop was Brabyns Park in Marple where on the small pond, the Moorhen family seemed to be getting on very well and I'm glad to say that the young have escaped the attention of the Grey Heron that was stalking them a couple of weeks back...

The pond is now almost entirely covered in Lilly pads and I shall return in a couple of weeks when the Lilly's are in bloom.

Next I visited another location close to home and I was very pleased to see a new family of Greylag Geese, including this little cutie...

The young Coots are doing well also and they really are funny looking creatures when they reach this stage in their development, with their tiny heads, tiny wings and huge feet...

The Egg Snatcher!

A quick trip to a small local pond that I hadn't visited for some time provided some interesting bird behaviour today.

I had planned to visit the pond to photograph Frogs, but on arrival I knew my chances would be slim because I wasn't the only visitor...

Grey Herons are notorious Frog eaters, but on this occasion at least, his luck was also out and he settled for a few Sticklebacks before making his exit...

The Heron actually missed out on a bit of a treat, because lying in the reeds only a few yards away was the egg of a Moorhen.

The egg wasn't going to survive the morning intact though and a short time later it was punctured...

Exhibit A

So who or what committed this terrible crime against the Moorhen egg?

Did the Grey Heron return?

Well no actually, the guilty party was non other than...

A Moorhen!

Strange goings on you may say and yes not something you see everyday, but not altogether unheard of.

I might be wrong but my theory is...The Moorhen in question was a male and with it being the breeding season, he destroyed the egg so he could have a (or another) go at mating with the female.