BROKEN WING TRICK

gsganzer · May 11, 2005

The wife and I were sitting on the back porch one day, watching a momma killdeer in our pasture. She was walking around with her feathers and wings all pushed out and hanging down. It made her look like she was wearing one of those southern belle dresses.
She came to a stop and slightly parted her wings, two little miniature killdeere babies came scurrying out from under her "dress". When momma figured they had been allowed to run around long enough, she gave a little call. The two babies scurried back to momma and climbed back under her "dress". It was the neatest thing to see. We still chuckle about it.

PineRidge · May 11, 2005

Neat pictures Frank. We see Killdeer's quite a bit and always try to mark the nest so we don't accidentally break the eggs. I have yet to see any young birds though. The only thing we can figure is when they hatch momma keeps them a little better hidden.

frank_f15 · May 11, 2005

Bird : i had a nest last year , that for some reason the eggs did not hatch, that mother bird (no pun intended /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif) would not leave that nest . she sat it for weeks & weeks.

frank_f15 · May 11, 2005

when i find mine i use a can of contractor spay paint and mark the ground , so i don't destroy the nest, seems kind of silly , but what the heck /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

frank_f15 · May 11, 2005

mike you got that right, of all the KILLDEER nest i have had in my fields, i only ever saw a nest with 3 chicks, come to think of it i never did see the momma or dad after they hatched, so i just stayed clear of them and then after a few weeks they were, gone.

BB_TX · May 12, 2005

<font color="blue"> I have yet to see any young birds though. </font>
Newly hatched, they are amazingly hard to see even on open ground. Like a little fuzzy golf ball on stilts that blend in with the ground color. As a defense mechanism they will sometimes freeze up if you begin to get close to them so that you don't see them moving. If the eggs are gone but the mother is still doing the wing trick, look very closely all around because the chicks are probably nearby.

PineRidge · May 12, 2005

Don't Kildeer's have any natural predators? I mean wouldn't marking a nest make it also easier for predators to also find the same bird and eggs, or maybe a wild animal wouldn't equate a flag or paint mark on the ground to a free, easy meal? /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

BB_TX · May 12, 2005

There are a couple free roaming cats in the area, but I have never seen one near one of my small flags. And I have never seen one chasing either the chicks or the adult killdeers. I would guess the broken wing trick would work well against the cats if they got near the nests or chicks. If I walk toward a nest, the parent will fly to the left or right 15 to 20 feet and then start the wing trick to try to pull me away from the direction of the nest.

frank_f15 · May 13, 2005

no i don't think a flag or paint marks will attract anything to destroy the nest, cats might be a problem for the bird but not for the eggs.

JJT · May 14, 2005

We also get Killdeer, I mark any nests I find with a 5 gallon bucket and avoid the area.

When my youngest was little he caught a baby Killdeer and brought it to us. He must have been 3, mother Killdeer carried on until we got the baby back to her.

Another time our Newfie trapped 1 between her front feet, once she caught him, she didn't know what to do. 130# towering over a 2 ounce bird, quite the picture. Again the baby was returned unharmed to the mother.

The babies are like chickens, they can run shortly after they are born - this is their only defense mechanism with the nest being on the ground. Fairly quickly they are self sufficient. I've been told they will have multiple broods if the weather cooperates.