Baby phoebe grows up

Black phoebe, Oct. 6, 2010

This little fella obligingly posed for me last weekend. My guess is that it is one of this year's hatchlings. Why? Bear with me as I elaborate on the gory details.

We host a friend's bee hives in our garden, and our yard has become a rich hunting ground for phoebes. In late spring I observed (to both my delight and dismay) phoebes predating these bee hives. They'd perch on the fence behind the hive, swoop out and snatch a bee, then return to the fence to vigorously bash its prey to death before sending it down the hatch. It would gobble up two or three more bees in similar fashion before heading off, presumably to the nest. As I was working in the garden one Saturday I observed phoebes hunting and returning in this fashion, and estimated that, in one day, they dispatched at least 70 bees, probably more.

Later in the summer, these phoebes brought their fledglings to our garden to feast upon the bee buffet. As observed earlier, the adult habitually killed its bee before eating or feeding it to a fledgling. Juveniles hunted awkwardly, occasionally catching a bee but most often coming up empty-beaked and begging a treat from its parent.

I watched this weekend's visitor it for several minutes before it flew away to its next destination and its my guess that it's one of this year's fledglings. Its plumage was fresh, not worn as an adults would be after a season of caring for young, and its hunting behavior seemed somewhat awkward. It wasn't particularly skilled at catching insects, and when it did make a catch it held its prey in its bill for some time before eating it. However, when it caught a bee it failed to dash its little bee brains on a fencepost. I'm anxious to see if Little Baby grows up to be a bee basher like Mommy and Daddy.