A new bird I have never seen! I went to a local cemetery to see if I could find some interesting subjects, and I kept hearing what I thought were hawks--loud screeches. Finally, my eye fell on a pair of these birds running along the cemetery grass and doing all kinds of tricks--flying in circles, wings making sounds like a mourning dove when it moves, and screeching over and over. I believe it was a male female pair. Once landed, one would lie very low to the ground and display it's tail feathers by spreading them out. Mating ritual? I was so excited to see a new bird! Last week, a blue grosbeak came around (never saw one of those before either, but my camera was not nearby -- well, it was, but my card was up in the computer). Love it when a new bird comes on my radar, and I can look it up after I run around chasing it in a cemetery of all things. No I did not walk on the graves. I caught one in flight, but it's pretty awful, so here is the best one of the bunch!
We used to have them in our yard in IL. They would lay eggs in the rocks near our septic tank, then flop around like they were wounded to distract us from them every time we went out to mow grass. It was funny at first, but got old after a while! LOL! They finally figured out that wasn't a good place to lay eggs.
Wonderfully sharp. Killdeer are great parents, and extremely theatrical and noisy about protecting their nests. I love these birds and their little ones, and shamelessly tease them by refusing to follow them as they try to draw me away from their eggs or hatchlings, though finding the nest is usually quite difficult as their camouflage is so good.
Awesome! They lay their eggs on the ground so all that activity was meant to draw you away from the nest. The female is quite good at acting wounded to entice a predator away from her babies.
You've captured him in a moment of hesitation -- to fly or not to fly. I love those long legs, too. How did you avoid stepping on graves? I'm never sure where the body is and am sure I've trampled all over the dearly beloveds' resting places.
They are common here. What you probably saw was an attempt to lure you away from a nest by making you think he / she was injured. Their eggs look like pebbles, so they lay them in the open on the ground, sometimes in dopey places like gravel roads. You did well to get this close to the uncooperative critter.
