IT’S up, it’s up—quick! Oh, no, it’s dived again.’ Such is the lament of the birdwatcher attempting to point out a diver or grebe to a companion. Whether the subject is a stately great northern diver floating off a picture-perfect Hebridean beach or a diminutive black-necked grebe playing hide and seek among a flock of ducks in the deepest reaches of an Essex reservoir, the challenge is the same. These masters of the underwater world seem to shun the feeling of air on their feathers, such is their eagerness to immerse and immerse again.
Of all the UK’s waterbirds and seabirds, few are as well adapted to swim underwater as divers and grebes. Their stout legs, with webbed toes in divers and lobed in grebes, sit so far back on their bodies that they can barely walk or stand, hence the local nickname of ‘arse-foot’ for some species. How-ever, this extreme foot position provides an extra-powerful ‘outboard motor’ to drive their fast underwater fish-chases.
Divers and grebes are not closely related, as was once thought: divers are an early offshoot of the same lineage as penguins, whereas grebes count flamingos as their closest cousins. However, the two groups’ anatomy, ecology and behaviour are remarkably similar. Our three regularly seen diver species and five grebes nest on the edges and islands of lakes and are strongly monogamous, sharing incubation and care of the chicks, which can swim from hatching, but need to be fed for many weeks. Because of the commitment they will need from one another for a successful breeding season, the male and female rigorously test each other’s attentiveness, fitness and partnership skills through dramatic and often noisy displays, showing off their bright breeding colours. After breeding, they become drabber and quieter, with many dispersing to larger lakes or the sea.
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
