Those are great pictures! I like the arrangement of the 4 birds so that there's a bit of space between nos 3 and 4, so the balance is interesting. And the body of the bird in flight is in actual focus! If it were me, I'd have gotten either the near or far wings with a blurry little bee-eatin' body.
Why bees? Sort of work intensive, isn't it? Isn't it a bit like eating blowfish, making sure you don't get the bad bits?
Ooh, or eeuw, depending ... the birds do have to learn to get rid of the poisonous bits ...
I found this on a "Bee-eater fact sheet"
Technique for making bees ready to eat while on a perch: (Fry 1984) Position bee so it is held just behind the thorax. Smack bee's head against perch. Quickly change grip to hold tip of abdomen. Rub tail-end against perch till it and the sting is crushed or ejected. The head is rapped once or twice and the bee can then be swallowed. A bee-eater raised in captivity by Fry (1984) learned on its own to express venom from bees prior to eating them.
Speedway, you ARE the Queen of Research. Thank goodness there's always some scientist with too much time on his hands, wondering about the kind of things normal people would never give a thought to and obsessively experimenting and writing down their observations.
They are indeed beautiful, Ms.M. And it's good to know how they do it in case we're marooned somewhere with only bees to eat.
6 comments:
They are so colourful…
I like the way they wear those little bandit masks so the bees won't recognise them.
Those are great pictures! I like the arrangement of the 4 birds so that there's a bit of space between nos 3 and 4, so the balance is interesting. And the body of the bird in flight is in actual focus! If it were me, I'd have gotten either the near or far wings with a blurry little bee-eatin' body.
Why bees? Sort of work intensive, isn't it? Isn't it a bit like eating blowfish, making sure you don't get the bad bits?
Ooh, or eeuw, depending ... the birds do have to learn to get rid of the poisonous bits ...
I found this on a "Bee-eater fact sheet"
Technique for making bees ready to eat while on a perch: (Fry 1984)
Position bee so it is held just behind the thorax.
Smack bee's head against perch.
Quickly change grip to hold tip of abdomen.
Rub tail-end against perch till it and the sting is crushed or ejected.
The head is rapped once or twice and the bee can then be swallowed.
A bee-eater raised in captivity by Fry (1984) learned on its own to express venom from bees prior to eating them.
Fantastic photos, especially of the bird in flight! Beautiful colors and markings.
Interesting facts about "bee dinner preparations", Speedway. So THAT'S how they do it....
Speedway, you ARE the Queen of Research. Thank goodness there's always some scientist with too much time on his hands, wondering about the kind of things normal people would never give a thought to and obsessively experimenting and writing down their observations.
They are indeed beautiful, Ms.M. And it's good to know how they do it in case we're marooned somewhere with only bees to eat.
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