

Remarkable Birds
Season 2 Episode 9 | 27m 15sVideo has Closed Captions
Tony looks at some really interesting bird species in the lowcountry.
There’s something about birds that make people like them. In this episode, Tony will introduce you to some really interesting bird species you can find in the lowcountry.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
Coastal Kingdom is a local public television program presented by SCETV
Support for this program is provided by The ETV Endowment of South Carolina.

Remarkable Birds
Season 2 Episode 9 | 27m 15sVideo has Closed Captions
There’s something about birds that make people like them. In this episode, Tony will introduce you to some really interesting bird species you can find in the lowcountry.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorship♪♪ >> MILLS: [ Laughs ] So, this is a little American alligator.
It's not a crocodile.
Okay, here we go.
Here's a couple more.
In fact, one of them just flew.
♪♪ [ Birds chirping ] ♪♪ >> MILLS: I'm not sure what it is about birds that makes them so appealing.
Maybe it's the variety of colors they come in, the elaborate courtship behaviors they display, or the cool methods that they have for securing food and capturing prey.
Maybe it's just the fact that they can take off and fly sometimes hundreds of miles to breeding grounds or feeding areas.
Whatever the reason, most people really like birds.
Let's take a look at some of the avian fauna that we have right here in the Low Country.
♪♪ >> MILLS: The woods behind me are home to one of the coolest birds of all -- the butcherbird.
And biologist Amy Tegeler from the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources is here to show us one.
>> TEGELER: Yeah, so, we're in the moors today, and we're gonna go out and look for some loggerhead shrikes.
They're a really cool bird that lives here in South Carolina.
They are frequently seen in pastures, and they also like two- or three-year post-clear-cut areas, early shrub-scrub habitat.
But here in South Carolina, we also see them in some of this open-pine savanna.
>> MILLS: And you've seen them here, right?
>> TEGELER: Yes, yes.
We have seen some here right behind us.
So, loggerhead shrikes have a really cool natural history.
>> MILLS: Yeah, and I have to tell my story.
When I was in college, I actually found a six-lined racerunner, a really cool lizard, and it was impaled on a barbed-wire fence.
And at first, I was like, "Who could have done this to this lizard?"
I did a little bit of research and found out it was a loggerhead shrike that had stuck that thing on the barbed-wire fence.
>> TEGELER: Yes, yes.
Their feeding strategy is really amazing.
So what they'll do is, they will capture small things, like small mammals, small birds, frogs, insects, and what they do is, they collect them in their strong beak, and then they'll hit them against hard objects, like a tree or a wall, or they will take it and they will pierce it with a barbed-wire fence or a hawthorn in order to kill their prey so they can eat it.
>> MILLS: So butcherbird is an appropriate name.
>> TEGELER: Yes.
That's why they're called the butcherbird, and it's a really unique and interesting part of their natural history.
>> MILLS: So, most people have never seen a shrike.
Are their numbers declining?
>> TEGELER: Yes.
Their numbers have declined over the last few decades, and that's part of the reasons we're doing this research.
This is a research project -- it's in Canada all the way down through the southeastern part of the U.S., so this is part of a large regional project.
>> MILLS: And you're actually gonna catch birds, so how are we gonna catch one?
That's what I'm so excited about.
>> TEGELER: Yeah, so, today we're gonna go out, we're gonna try to find them, and then we have some traps that we're gonna set out, and hopefully, the birds will fly right in, and then we'll catch them and take some measurements and put some bands on.
♪♪ ♪♪ >> MILLS: Amy, I think there's a bird right next to the cage.
♪♪ >> TEGELER: Got one.
I'm gonna go get it.
♪♪ >> MILLS: Amy, so, we've caught a bird.
I'm just excited about seeing one up close.
I've seen them in the field a bunch from a long distance, but this is gonna be really cool.
>> TEGELER: Yeah.
>> MILLS: I love that cool band through the eye.
>> TEGELER: Yes.
Yeah.
They're a gorgeous bird.
>> MILLS: It's just a handsome bird.
Is it a male or a female?
It's kind of tough to tell, isn't it?
>> TEGELER: Yeah.
This time of year, it's gonna be really hard.
During the breeding season, the females will have a brood patch to incubate the eggs.
So I could just blow on the belly... [ Blows ] ...and it'd be -- you could see the belly through the feathers.
>> MILLS: I noticed it's nipping you a little bit, so they have pretty sharp nails.
>> TEGELER: Yes, so, one of the first things I'm gonna do is put it in a little toilet-paper-roll tube so that it doesn't do that.
>> MILLS: Oh, that's really cool.
That's ingenious.
>> TEGELER: And the birds do okay in this.
There's plenty of room in there.
>> MILLS: What kind of information do you need to get from it?
>> TEGELER: We're gonna get some information on the age.
We're going to take some morphological measurements, so we're gonna take some measurements of the legs and the wings to try to get an idea of the body condition.
We are gonna put some color bands, a unique set of color bands, on these legs, on the legs of this bird, so we know exactly which individual this is when we see it again.
And then we're also gonna put an aluminum band on the leg with a unique number on it.
>> MILLS: And so you hope to get a recapture of this bird, right?
You hope to see it again?
>> TEGELER: I hope to see it again, yep.
So, in the breeding season, we're gonna come back out here to see if it's still here and to see if it has a territory and a nest.
If you could see, the color bands, they wrap around the leg a few times, and we do that because the shrikes are really, really skilled with their mouth.
>> MILLS: That cool beak.
>> TEGELER: So they're very, very good at prying off color bands.
Each bird's gonna have a dark green on it because that is for our state -- our state color.
However, the two colors on the other leg are gonna be different for each bird, and that's how we're gonna know which individual this is.
So, on this bird, we have a light-blue and a white band.
>> MILLS: Right.
So, these guys are year-round residents, but how far do they move?
>> TEGELER: That's part of what we're trying to find out.
We kind of -- The general thought is that many of our shrikes are year-round residents.
Resighting these birds will help us know -- are they truly residents?
Are they short-distance migrants?
Maybe they just move around in South Carolina.
Maybe they just move to different places on the moor.
We're also gonna be collecting some feathers -- samples... >> MILLS: Genetic material for... >> TEGELER: Yeah, and so we're gonna be looking at stable-isotope analysis and hopefully some trace elements from these different feathers.
>> MILLS: So, you know, essentially, you have this bird in your hand.
It's neat to just look at some of the features that help it to do what it does.
And I notice the beak and the feet.
And, boy, that coloration is just fabulous, isn't it?
>> TEGELER: Yeah.
And so, if you can see on the beak -- Ow.
It keeps on biting me.
It has some hooks on it, and this species -- they typically eat live prey, and they use that beak to have a tight grip on their prey.
>> MILLS: Like a raptor, even though it's not a raptor, to tear things apart, right?
>> TEGELER: Yep.
Yes.
>> MILLS: Do they use the feet at all for capturing prey?
>> TEGELER: No.
They don't have the strong talons, like a hawk or an eagle.
No, they are very reliant on more their beak.
So, we're finished processing this bird, so we can take it out into the field and release it now.
>> MILLS: Great.
♪♪ So, can I do the honors?
>> TEGELER: Sure.
>> MILLS: Okay, so, I'm gonna take him right -- Ow!
Boy, that does... >> TEGELER: It does hurt.
>> MILLS: I saw you get bit a whole bunch of times.
[ Both laugh ] It's more funny when you get bit than when I get bit.
Okay, so, what I'm gonna do is just kind of hold him like this and let him go.
>> TEGELER: Just keep your hand under and let go.
>> MILLS: Okay, well, here goes.
♪♪ Looks good.
>> TEGELER: Yeah.
>> MILLS: Looks like he's doing well.
>> TEGELER: He's great.
>> MILLS: Well, thank you so much for letting us join in your research today, and I appreciate all that you're doing for birds like shrikes and other species.
>> TEGELER: Oh, it's my pleasure.
Thank you.
♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ >> MILLS: Okay, so, we were driving along the road, and we saw some kind of ruckus in this mustard, and there's a red-tailed hawk right in here, and he keeps climbing on the top of this building, these ruins, and then jumping back down into this mustard, and he's obviously hunting something.
I assume it's a small mammal or a snake.
We don't know for sure, but he's really bouncing around in there, too, and that's not something that you -- I've not seen this before, but, you know, they're voracious predators, and they eat snakes, small mammals, squirrels -- all kinds of things.
Not exactly sure what he has here.
♪♪ Now, to complicate things even further, there's a couple crows that are flying around and probably scaring off what he's trying to catch.
But crows are pretty rough on raptors.
I mean, they don't like raptors around, and so they're gonna caw and try and run off birds like this.
It's got a snake.
Oh, my gosh!
So that was a snake -- I mean, a great big snake.
Looks like a rat snake.
And so maybe we can see.
That was absolutely incredible.
So we now figured out [Chuckling] what he was chasing around, so a rat snake.
All right, let's go see if we can find him.
Guys, that was a big snake.
That thing was 3 1/2, 4 feet long.
He's right on the ground.
He's right here.
He's actually eating the snake.
I can see his mouth moving.
Obviously, he can't swallow this thing whole, so what he's doing is ripping it into little strips so that he can gulp them down.
♪♪ Wow.
Boy, that is a big snake!
So, the hawk flew off with the snake.
He's actually perched in this tree over here.
You can see the snake kind of hanging down.
But, you know, I think we ought to let him finish his snake in peace.
But I'll tell you what.
You rarely get to see things like this in nature.
This is really cool.
♪♪ Chris is gonna show us a really common but really secretive animal that lives right here in the salt marsh, and we're gonna stay low so they can't see us.
>> MARSH: Clapper rail is an amazing animal.
It blends in.
We're in a special place because there's so many territories here.
We've got some background noise.
>> MILLS: I heard some cawing, but I also hear the din of Parris Island in the background.
>> MARSH: That's right.
It shows that, even if a bird's secretive, it can live close to people, and people don't even know it.
>> MILLS: Right, and, obviously, these birds are used to it.
>> MARSH: And just one of the things we're gonna do is we're gonna use a playback to see what we can get, and this is the sound of a clapper rail right here.
[ Bird chirping ] >> MILLS: So, we'll see if one walks out, but tell us a little bit about this bird.
>> MARSH: It's a bird of the salt marsh, and it gets its name, clapper rail, because of the sound it makes.
Matter of fact, often, if you -- particularly in the wintertime, or sometimes you can clap your hands real loud, and it'll get them to respond, sort of like... >> MILLS: Let's see if we... >> MARSH: We can do that.
>> MILLS: Listen.
>> MARSH: It works better in the winter than the breeding season.
>> MILLS: Yeah, it's definitely -- I've seen it work before.
>> MARSH: Yeah, so hence the name.
It's a bird that has a lot of predators.
It's very important to the salt marsh, as far as being a major predator itself, though, of invertebrates.
And it's migratory for some areas, but we're so mild here in South Carolina, our birds are not migratory.
>> MILLS: Right.
Now, clapper rails are common but hard to see, right?
>> MARSH: That's right.
Think about it.
If you have a bunch of predators, then you're gonna be secretive.
Everything about the bird is designed to keep it from being seen.
>> MILLS: Right.
And the term "rail-thin" comes from the fact that they are very slender from side to side so they can move through the grass and, in this case, the spartina grass without -- >> MARSH: Spartina grass.
>> MILLS: And they feed primarily on crabs and shrimp as adults, right?
>> MARSH: That's correct, and anything that's small size, so they also feed on fish, as well.
There's even one instance of a clapper rail running up and grabbing a least sandpiper and running back into the grass.
>> MILLS: Wow.
>> MARSH: So they're very opportunistic.
>> MILLS: Okay, well, I don't see any around here.
But you want to move to another spot?
>> MARSH: Yeah.
This is an area where they move through and there's some deeper grass, but I know an area where it's right next to a place I think they're nesting.
And they're nesting right now.
There might even be some chicks.
>> MILLS: All right.
Let's go give it a try.
>> MARSH: Okay.
Sounds good.
♪♪ [ Bird chirping ] >> MILLS: I see one.
>> MARSH: This one over there.
>> MILLS: Yep.
It's coming right at me.
>> MARSH: Don't move.
Don't move.
Watch real slowly.
Look at the stripes on the side of the body, because that shows that they're adapted for living in grass by having those vertical stripes.
It helps break up the shape of the bird.
Look at the bill, how the bill's slightly curved.
Now, look.
They swim, also, so here comes one swimming.
>> MILLS: Oh, wow, look at him swim.
That's really cool.
>> MARSH: And look at that bill.
It's slightly curved, and they use that for getting -- They love fiddler crabs, like most things in the salt marsh.
[ Bird chirping ] And they also -- >> MILLS: [ Laughs ] They are really calling away, too.
Is this announcing that this is their territory?
>> MARSH: Yes, it is, and because we did the playback, they know that another clapper rail, or they think another clapper rail, is in their territory.
And this is the song.
We're gonna play the call one more time.
[ Bird chirping ] >> MILLS: I can see a head poking around.
Here we go.
Here we go, right in front of us.
>> MARSH: The neat thing about being in South Carolina is that we have clapper rails that breed, but in the wintertime, all the birds that are to the north of us, the clapper rails that nest up in Virginia up through New England, come down here and spend the winter with us.
So that's the other time we'll see them.
It's got chicks!
>> MILLS: Oh, my gosh.
Look!
>> MARSH: We got two parents with chicks.
So we've got a family.
>> MILLS: You notice, boy, the chicks are jet-black, aren't they?
>> MARSH: Yeah, they're jet-black.
>> MILLS: There's three.
I see three, Chris.
>> MARSH: Yeah, and there was another one that came before, so they have at least four.
♪♪ The clapper rails have a brood.
Usually, they lay an average of 10 eggs in a nest, and the nest is a platform that keeps the eggs out of the water during the high tides.
And they've documented that clapper rail eggs can actually be submerged by high tide and still hatch, so they're amazing.
>> MILLS: How long can they be submerged?
For a whole tidal cycle?
>> MARSH: For a whole tidal cycle.
Look at these chicks.
By the way, these chicks are at least a week old.
>> MILLS: Boy, the chicks are huge.
>> MARSH: Yeah.
We think these chicks are about a week old.
♪♪ >> MILLS: So, we've moved a little bit closer, Chris.
I'd hate to -- It's hard to not point.
>> MARSH: I know.
It's really, really difficult.
>> MILLS: This one has some mud on its beak, so, obviously, it's been probing for crabs and shrimp.
Here comes a chick.
>> MARSH: There goes the chick.
>> MILLS: Oh, my gosh.
>> MARSH: Now, the cool thing about these chicks is they're like little chickens.
They're what we call precocial.
When the eggs hatch, they're fully feathered, and within an hour, they can leave the nest, and so the parents stay with them and warn them about predators.
>> MILLS: There's two chicks right in front of us.
>> MARSH: Yeah, I see.
>> MILLS: I'll try not to point.
There goes one.
There goes the other one.
>> MARSH: Looking around.
You can have them right in the grass right next to you.
It's an easy bird to overlook unless you know what the sound is like.
And we just are very fortunate to be here at a time when they're a lot more visible because it's the breeding season and they're taking care of chicks.
And this is a unique place where we can be secretive and enter the birds' world, and they let us get closer.
♪♪ [ Bird chirping ] >> MILLS: There he goes again.
>> MARSH: There he goes.
>> MILLS: One more walk-by.
>> MARSH: That's right.
>> MILLS: Well, Chris, I can safely say that's the closest I've ever been to a clapper rail.
I appreciate you spending the day with us and taking us out and showing us this.
>> MARSH: Well, it was great to be able to do this with you.
We need to do this more often.
>> MILLS: I agree.
♪♪ ♪♪ >> MILLS: Today, we're gonna capture and band one of the most beautiful birds in the Low Country, and Lex Glover from the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources has been studying these birds for 20 years.
And I'll tell you, I'm real excited about this, Lex, 'cause I've never seen a Baltimore oriole in the wild.
>> GLOVER: Well, good deal.
We hope that's gonna change today.
>> MILLS: Well, how many have you caught and banded?
>> GLOVER: I probably have trapped and banded about 1,400.
>> MILLS: Yeah, so you're a little ahead of me.
>> GLOVER: A little bit.
>> MILLS: So, Lex, I've seen these birds in field guides, and they're beautiful, but can you tell me a little bit more about coloration and size?
>> GLOVER: Yes, these birds are about the size of a cardinal or a red-winged blackbird, and they're actually a member of the blackbird family, so they've got that nice long, pointed bill.
The males are a brilliant orange underneath, and they have black on top.
Their heads are black, their wings are black, so it's a very striking color -- it's something you can't miss if you see it, you know, up in a tree somewhere.
>> MILLS: Well, I tell you what's really neat about this.
We're in somebody's backyard.
>> GLOVER: Yeah.
>> MILLS: And so this is important habitat for these birds, right?
>> GLOVER: It is.
A lot of people do not think of it like that, but I have a lot of homeowners that appreciate the fact that we come out and study these birds that they feed or have in their backyard.
They like the idea that their backyard is now part of a bigger picture.
>> MILLS: Yeah, I'll tell you what.
Before we talked about doing this segment, I didn't even know Baltimore orioles showed up in South Carolina.
>> GLOVER: They haven't been around all that long.
I think it was back in the 1940s that the birds were first noted wintering in the state.
>> MILLS: So they're not here all year?
>> GLOVER: They are not.
They're a winter resident for us.
>> MILLS: All right, so, you have a really ingenious trap for catching these, and I'm fascinated by this 'cause I love traps.
>> GLOVER: Okay.
>> MILLS: I love to catch things.
So can you tell us a little bit about how this works?
>> GLOVER: Sure.
I just happened to take a seed-feeder trap, and basically, it works like a fish or a crab trap.
The birds go in, and they can't quite see how to get out.
>> MILLS: And I see what the bait is -- grape jelly, huh?
>> GLOVER: Grape jelly.
That's one of their favorite backyard bird foods.
I'm not sure who decided to offer grape jelly to birds or what bird decided to taste it, but it's very similar to the sugar water that the hummingbirds feed on.
>> MILLS: So they love grape jelly, but what would they normally be feeding on?
>> GLOVER: They're feeding heavily on insects.
We still have a sizable population of insects throughout the winter.
>> MILLS: Well, I'm excited about this 'cause I like looking at birds through binoculars, but it's even more fun to think about catching one and holding it in your hands.
♪♪ There's an oriole sitting in a tree right here, so we're hoping he's gonna come for this grape jelly.
>> GLOVER: We're all set, so we'll just step back and let the birds come in.
>> MILLS: Okay.
♪♪ So, Lex, I'm gonna peek around the corner, and we hear some chattering.
>> GLOVER: We hear some chattering, so there could be a bird in the trap.
>> MILLS: Yeah.
>> GLOVER: We got some.
Okay.
If you'll go get the trap, I'll get the -- >> MILLS: Oh, my gosh.
>> GLOVER: We got quite a few, actually.
>> MILLS: A whole bunch of them.
[ Chuckling ] Wow!
That's a lot of birds, Lex.
>> GLOVER: Yeah.
>> MILLS: The allure of grape jelly.
>> GLOVER: That's right.
>> MILLS: Did we get the whole flock?
>> GLOVER: We might have.
Let's see.
>> MILLS: Okay, Lex, I'm gonna go ahead and grab one of these birds.
And I'll use that grip you taught me.
And let's just real quick look at this.
So, this is a female, isn't it?
>> GLOVER: Well, we'll see.
It's likely a female, or it could be an immature male.
>> MILLS: Boy, they are beautiful.
Even the females of this species are very brightly colored.
>> GLOVER: Right.
>> MILLS: And I see that classic blackbird bill.
I imagine they can poke you pretty good with this, can't they?
>> GLOVER: That's right.
That's right.
>> MILLS: Okay, so, he needs to go in the box, right?
>> GLOVER: Yeah, so we'll go in this one right here.
>> MILLS: This is a really ingenious little box for keeping them.
♪♪ Boy, look at the coloration on that.
>> GLOVER: So, this is what we call an after-second-year bird.
That means this bird is at least 2 years old because it takes 2 years for them to become an adult.
>> MILLS: How long do these birds live?
>> GLOVER: Most of our songbirds will live on average of five years.
>> MILLS: Oh, okay.
You know, Lex, I like looking at birds through binoculars, but this is my kind of birding right here.
>> GLOVER: But to have it in the hand, it's a whole nother world.
>> MILLS: Yeah, I agree.
There we go.
>> GLOVER: All right.
>> MILLS: All right.
>> GLOVER: Okay, so, the first thing we want to do is get the band on the bird.
And these bands are lightweight.
They're made out of aluminum.
As you know, our wild birds are protected, federal and state law, so you have to be permitted in order to do this kind of work with a wild bird.
We're gonna check for fat.
No fat.
We're gonna measure the wing.
Now we're gonna get a weight.
>> MILLS: So, I like your little tube.
>> GLOVER: Yeah.
>> MILLS: Bird has to stand on his head for just a second.
That's a very good way to weigh it, isn't it?
>> GLOVER: It is because, again, it keeps the bird dark and calm.
♪♪ >> MILLS: Okay, so, we're about to let this guy go.
So, where will this bird go from here?
>> GLOVER: That's one of the reasons why we're banding these birds, is we want to know where they're gonna go, where did they come from, where do they go to breed?
I have gotten one band recovery since I've been banding these birds.
A bird that I banded in Myrtle Beach two years later showed up in British Columbia.
>> MILLS: Oh, wow.
>> GLOVER: And that is just awesome.
>> MILLS: And so South Carolina is an important part of this whole equation, right?
>> GLOVER: It is.
In fact, the last three years, through our survey work, we've had more wintering Baltimore orioles in our state than any other state in the country.
>> MILLS: More than Baltimore?
>> GLOVER: [ Chuckling ] Yes.
More than Baltimore.
All right, Tony, you want to let this one go?
>> MILLS: I do.
>> GLOVER: Okay.
>> MILLS: [ Chuckles ] A parting -- couple of parting bites there.
>> GLOVER: There you go.
>> MILLS: Okay, here we go.
Flew off perfectly.
Well, I'll tell you what's gonna happen from this segment, is people are gonna want to know, how can they attract Baltimore orioles to their yards in South Carolina?
So what's the trick to that?
>> GLOVER: The trick is to put out jelly.
Put out a little container of jelly and see what you get.
Not only do Baltimore orioles feed on jelly, but other species of birds will also feed on it.
Again, it's like a hummingbird feeder.
It's a quick source of food.
>> MILLS: Well, Lex, thank you so much.
This is amazing.
>> GLOVER: Sure.
>> MILLS: I mean, we caught 18 Baltimore orioles.
>> GLOVER: 18.
>> MILLS: And I sure appreciate the work that you're doing, the work that South Carolina Department of Natural Resources is doing.
>> GLOVER: Thank you.
>> MILLS: This was a great day.
>> GLOVER: It was.
I enjoyed it.
Thanks.
♪♪ [ Engine starts ] >> MILLS: Guys, I witnessed something yesterday that you just have to see.
Let's go see if they're still there.
[ Gearshift clicking ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Keys jingling ] Yep, looks like they're still here.
♪♪ ♪♪ If you guys look right here, here are the spoonbills.
They're here.
There are whole bunch of them -- 40, 50 birds, maybe.
Now, this is really exciting because over the past few days, it started with nine, and then it was 26, and now it's 40 or 50.
So somehow, the word is getting out that this is a great spot to feed, and the birds seem to know.
And I see young birds, which are much, much lighter, and I also see what looks like some slightly more mature birds, which have more pink and some bright-pink splotches on the wings.
Now, this coloration is derived from carotenoids, and those are from what they eat.
♪♪ I see some great egrets in there.
♪♪ Looks like a great blue heron.
And some tricolored herons, too.
So, spoonbills will often feed with other species -- ibis and herons and egrets and things like that.
You can also see some wood storks coming in, too.
Now, all these animals are here because the water level has been lowered in this impoundment, and there's a lot to eat here.
Things that spoonbills like to eat include shrimp, crabs, even small fish.
And they've got these wonderful bills that they can wave back and forth, side to side.
They've got them slightly open.
You can see what they're feeding in.
[ Laughs ] They're feeding in silt and sort of mucky areas.
And they have to use that specialized bill to find the little crustaceans and shrimp and things that they eat.
Now, they have very sensitive nerve endings in the bill, so they can move it back and forth, and when they feel something, they close the bill, strain out the silt, and get the crab or shrimp or small fish.
Just very, very specialized feeding apparatus.
Of course, the wood storks are feeding slightly differently.
If they feel something, they snap the bill shut very quickly.
♪♪ Now, the other thing that's kind of interesting is, not only are the birds feeding here, but there's also a lot of fish feeding, so, you know, the fish are feeding on the same crabs and shrimps and things that the birds are, and so, occasionally, you'll see a splash of very likely a red drum or something like that.
♪♪ ♪♪ Oh, good stuff.
I just absolutely love spoonbills.
Now, males and females look similar -- almost exactly alike.
Spoonbills have a wingspan of about 4 feet long, so they're pretty big birds.
They weigh 2 1/2 to 5 pounds -- somewhere in there.
Spoonbills don't really nest in the Low Country -- primarily Florida and the Gulf Coast of Florida, Caribbean, Central and South America -- but we're seeing more and more of them around.
You know, I don't know about you guys, but I think it'd be pretty cool if they nested right here in the Low Country.
Thanks for joining us on "Coastal Kingdom."
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