LiD Paragraph #17

Bailey Lebreton

LiD paragraph

1-16-14

#17

Parental care

                 Parental care is very important the baby’s cannot survive on their own. These baby’s need special care and that’s why the parents are here.  After the baby birds are laid, the mother will start to get a brooding patch. This is a soft layer of warm wrinkly skin and some feathers.  The mothers will use it to nestle on the eggs.  The parents will put compost and sand to keep them just the right temperature.

Fledglings

                Fledglings are young birds that are just getting the hang of flying. They are almost ready to move out of the nest.  Parents will still feed the chick even if it already knows how to fly.  Sometimes birds are pronounced fledge even though they cannot fly.  The ancient Murrelet fledges two days after it is born.

Brood parasites

                Brood parasites are birds that lay there young in other birds’ nests.  Example:  If a cow bird lays their eggs in the Eastern Phoebe’s nest, the Eastern Phoebe will lay on their eggs hatch them and then feed them.   The benefits for the parasitic parent are they don’t have to care for, defend, or hatch their young.  The parasitic parent thus spends more time mating and hatching more eggs because they have more energy and time.  The disadvantage for the host parent is that they have to feed more chicks and the parasitic chicks tend to be larger and dominate during feeding or even kill the other, smaller chicks.  Some host parents, when they realize they have been tricked, will leave the entire nest to die, rather than raise somebody else’s brood.