I think we’ve all seen baby birds do the ‘feed me-feed me’ shake.  Young birds, just out of nest, are old enough to fly about but not quite old enough to feed themselves. And so, the babes are programed to still beg their parents for food like they did when still nestlings. They do this by striking a distinctive pose;

Fluffed up…Wings low and out to the side…Mouth WIDE open…Whole body shaking.

When the parents see this pose, they’re programmed to shove a meal into the offspring’s gaping mouth.

This morning I watched a young Lazuli Bunting do the ‘feed me-feed-me’ shake; only this baby was standing on a pile of millet seeds in my bird feeder!  The baby waited for one of its attentive parents to pick up one of those millet seeds and pop it into its mouth. The dutiful parent…probably doing the bird equivalent of an eye-roll…obliged the request and popped in a seed.

I suspect this behavior won’t be tolerated on for very long.

(from SVBC member Benjamin ‘Patch’ Patchett in Mt. Aukum, California)

Hey, SVBC members…send your Tiny Moments to us and we’ll post them! Send to:

eltangaral@gmail.com (Greg Homer)

or

alison.w.olivier@gmail,coim (Alison Olivieri)