Toadstools people usually call dirty gray mushrooms on a long stalk. For their resemblance to them very elegant water birds were also named. Most resemble a poisonous mushroom, large and small toadstool. The plumage of a bird has a dirty gray. A long neck is crowned with a head with a black-red collar (two tufts of feathers of a black shade), which makes this representative of birds very similar to the famous forest mushroom.
Description
A large grebe (chomga) bird has narrow and short wings, while the muscles that drive them make up only ten percent of the total weight (for a gull, for example, they are 2 times heavier). The flight is fast, but completely non-maneuverable: the bird, unlike the same gull, cannot boast of aerobatics - it flies exclusively in a straight line.
Landing and take-off for her, as if for an airplane, is by no means a simple matter. True, here a comparison with a seaplane is more appropriate. The bird does not dare to land on a hard surface, because it does not know how to damp speed, due to which it would hurt greatly on the ground. It is worth noting that water significantly softens the landing, which looks like an elementary drop.
Habitat
A toadstool bird lives in the eastern hemisphere of our planet. In the southern regions they are saddled, in the northern - migratory.
Birds fly to central Russia in April. Young grebes occupy only new nests. But the old people are mainly based on the old. Each pair of nesting site is quite extensive - several hundred meters in circumference. And he is zealously guarded by his spouses. At the same time, if there are few good places for nesting, the birds coexist normally in the colonies. For example, once in the Sea of Azov on the Long Island (this is a narrow strip of land 1.8 km long with a maximum width of 20 m), zoologists counted 165 nests.
Nest
Toadstool - a bird whose nest is mainly located in such a way that all growing vegetation - reed, reeds, sedge - protect it from the wind, prying eyes and waves. Also, there must certainly be free access for a bird swimming to it.
Sometimes the construction of a nest in birds alternates with currenting. Usually it precedes construction. Toadstool bird (her photos are presented in this article), having laid the next part of the building material, begins the courtesy ceremony. So, floating towards each other, they simultaneously lower, and then raise their heads. Then, sticking out his chest, they rise sharply above the water, while each repeats the movements of the other, as if in a mirror. Periodically, such wedding rituals are performed with a stalk in its beak. Looking at these birds with their graceful collars of feathers, you recall the grandiose movements of the ballet soloists - they move very gracefully and synchronously.
Breeding
Toadstool is a bird that lays 3-4 green-white testicles in May. They very quickly become olive-brown in color from rotting plants located in their nest. Females also contribute to this by covering their masonry with plants if they leave the nest for a short time. It should be noted that the female and male hatched eggs. In June, chicks already appear. They are already wonderful swimmers from birth, and parents teach them to dive.
This is also very interesting - one of the adults slowly swims past the kids, holding food in its beak, then again. And the kids, in turn, try to grab the fish. Following the grebe dives with her, inviting the children to do the same. But young people do not dare to follow the example of their parents. In this case, one of them puts food on the water and shouts from afar: "Kwong-kwong!"
Chicks throw a crowd, and only the best swimmer can get their well-deserved reward. It is touching to watch how the kids, tired of a long voyage, crawl onto the back of the parent to rest, after which she, diving, is released from her precious burden.
Toadstool (bird): food
Parents of striped chicks feed with worms, insects, fish. At the same time, they themselves do not refuse crustaceans, frogs, mollusks, but they certainly give preference to fish. One interesting feature should definitely be noted: you can always find a lump of feathers in grebes in the stomachs. Toadstool - a bird that collects them on the water, and also plucks at home. This is explained by the fact that they live in bodies of water in which there is silty soil.
Here you can not find stones that other birds swallow to improve the grinding of food in the stomachs. Although some ornithologists disagree with this common statement. They believe that the feather lump is a kind of sieve that retains fish bones. But no matter what the opinion is true, from the first days of life, chicks receive these feathers from their parents with food.
Young grebes become independent at the age of 2.5 months. At this time, they have brown plumage, and there are also not very clear stripes on the neck and head. Adult attire they will appear a little later. It should be noted that birds are especially elegant in the spring. Two bundles of horns (or ears) on the head and a collar on the neck of a red color form elongated feathers. The top of the ears and the edges of the collar are black. Wings and back with transverse white stripes - dark brown. And the lower torso is brilliant white.
