I was standing on the boardwalk at the beaver pond at Bethabara Park when I heard a familiar rattling call. The sound drew my eye to a kingfisher, hovering 20 feet over the surface of the pond, its body vertical, wings flapping to keep it stationary while it focused on its prey below.
Suddenly, it plunged and broke the surface with a splash. Just as quickly, it emerged, shook the water from its feathers and flew to one of the many tree snags in the pond.
It carried a small fish, only 2 or 3 inches long, to the perch where it battered it mercilessly against the snag as if to tenderize the morsel, manipulated it carefully in its beak, and then, with a toss of its head, swallowed its meal in a single gulp. Then it raised its crest, shook its head vigorously and wiped its bill on the perch as though it was a napkin.
Like all Belted Kingfishers, the bird's head looked too big for its body, and its shaggy crest only made it look bigger. But it is a beautiful bird, bright blue with a broad white collar and breast. It has a dark-blue band between the collar and the breast, and this is the belt the name alludes to. This was a female kingfisher, her gender made obvious by a second band, this one reddish brown, below the first.
Nesting in burrows
Another rattling call drew my attention to the male, perched across the pond on another snag. A few minutes later, he dove for a fish. But he failed. He returned to his perch and ruffled his feathers, as if to shrug off his miss. These are skillful predators, but their prey are equally skilled at avoiding them. It often takes several tries to capture a meal.
Belted Kingfishers are common in this area. They can be found at most any body of water: rivers, creeks, lakes or ponds. They nest in burrows that they excavate in stream or pond banks. They dig the burrows with their heavy beaks and push the dirt out with their feet. The burrow is horizontal, usually 3 to 6 feet long and about 3 to 4 inches in diameter. Here, the female will lay five to eight eggs, and both parents will incubate them until they hatch about 24 days later. Both the male and female feed the nestlings until they are ready to leave the nest -- or fledge -- at about 4 weeks old. Even at this early age, the young birds are almost indistinguishable from the parents. They have already grown to the same size as the adults, and their plumage looks very similar.
Kingfishers are year-round residents of our area and they can be seen at several parks. One of the easiest places to find them is at Historic Bethabara Park's beaver pond. It has boardwalks on the north and south sides that make it easy to get out in the middle of the marsh for easy viewing of Red-Winged Blackbirds, Great Blue Herons, woodpeckers and lots of other birds, including the kingfishers. The trails leading to the boardwalks can be accessed where its greenway crosses Old Town Drive or from parking near the intersection of Reynolda Road and Yadkinville Road.
Other good locations are Lake Katherine at Reynolda Gardens and the trails around Salem Lake.
For more information on these and other great places to see kingfishers and other birds, go to the Web site of the Audubon Society of Forsyth County at www.forsythaudubon.org and select "Birding Spots."
■ Bird's-Eye View is a joint column by Ron Morris and Phil Dickinson. Today's column was written by Morris. Morris retired after 24 years as curator at the N.C. Zoo. He has studied birds around the world and is currently the vice president of the Audubon Society of Forsyth County. Dickinson is a legal writer. He has been an active birder for 15 years, and is a past president of the Audubon Society of Forsyth County and heads the conservation committee. If you have a birding question or story idea, write to Bird's-Eye View in care of Features, Winston-Salem Journal, P.O. Box 3159, Winston-Salem, N.C. 27101-3159, or send an e-mail to birding@wsjournal.com. Please type "birds" in the subject line.
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