It is not as nice to eat on my own as it is when my mother feeds me...

We arrived at our campsite in the hot afternoon sun. Someone dropped a couple of breadcrumbs, probably the previous people who camped at our site. The space was full of small what I think are southern marked weavers, even a chick and its mother. I was able to capture this intimate moment, one in which the young chick was not feeling like eating him or herself. Instead, they relied on the mother to still feed it! In between the feedings, I saw that the chick was so hungry it ate some of the crumbs themselves, not relying on the mother.

It is funny how the chick waited for the mother, shaking its feathers in a peculiar way, indicating that it wanted to be fed. I did not have my video camera ready, as this would have been fascinating to see on video and to be able to have shared it with you.

You see mother in the background ripping the food pieces into smaller bits...

The mother still fed the small chick as if it could not eat him/herself, but I guess it is not the same as when mother feeds you! I could only imagine the discussion going on between them. The chick shouting Mom feed me! whilst the mom jumps up and down trying to feed the helpless chick. In the background an uncle or something smirks, saying These youth, cannot do anything for themselves!

In the end, or at the end of the ordeal, it flew into a nearby tree. It was only in the beak that I could tell that it was a chick. And then of course the rare moment of the mother feeding her chick!

My thoughts again, in these camping sites, move to the moral or ethical issues regarding feeding these birds. These birds are supposed to be wild and self-sufficient, not relying on human intervention. But these birds, in the campsites, rely on human food being fed to them. They will probably survive in the wild, without humans, but the fact that they are so tame and trustworthy is worrisome.

In any case, I hope you enjoyed this intimate moment I captured on photograph. These moments are rare and I only managed to capture it because we waiting and I stood there with my camera. If I was not ready with my camera I would not have caught the moment.

For now, happy photographing and birding, and keep well.

All of the photographs are my own, taken with my Nikon D300 and Tamron 300mm zoom lens. The musings and writings are also my own.