A Sad Identification
Posted Mar 29th, 2006 at 6:49 pm in Birding
A friend from Massachusetts sent me a couple of pictures last night, asking for help identifying a bird that got stuck in fishing line on the beach. Without a knife and the tides quickly rising, she couldn’t free it.
It’s a Red-necked Grebe, a heck of a bird in Texas. I’ve seen precisely one in my lifetime.
I think it’s a good reminder how much some of the little things matter. I see fishing line everywhere I go. I need to start picking it up everytime I see it.
And for anybody who likes to fish, keep in mind just how deadly your line can be if you leave it behind.
What if your friend had been carrying a knife or one of those multi-tooled gadgets with scissors. How dangerous would this bird’s beak become? I know herons and egrets go for the eyes when being rescued, what about grebes?
She actually had lost her pocket knife months before. Good reason to carry one I suppose.
As far as dangerous? I’m sure they might be able to hurt you, though nothing like an injured and angry Great Blue Heron, which are well known to remove people’s eyes with a strike of their bill.
That is really sad that the bird was caught in the fishing line. In New York, I don’t experience anything having to do with fishing lines but it’s sad when you see the seagulls around here eating trash that’s on the ground.