How does a swamp bird with long legs live?

There are many different creatures living on the swamps of our planet. Among them there are birds, adapted to survive in such extreme conditions. Waterbirds are a group of feathered creatures, wholly or in part devotees of the marshland. They have a peculiar structure of the body, allowing them to swim without any difficulty over the swamps and peat bogs.

What birds are found in the marshes?

To the water-swamp birds ornithologists include different families of birds, for example, gagar (Black-throated and Red-throated), grebe (small and large), cormorant, curly pelican, karavayku, bittern, etc. But they are not so well known to the common man in the street, as, for example, the queen of the marshes - heron, her eternal companion - the stork or the master of peat bogs - the crane! They should pay special attention.

Birds on long legs

What is the name of a wading bird on long legs? Probably most people will immediately come to mind a heron, a crane or a stork. And it's really so! Many species of these birds live exclusively on swamps and feed on what they find under their long legs. Usually their production lives on the surface of the earth or in shallow water.

To survive in conditions of constant dampness, acidity and lack of oxygen is not so simple. Therefore, some cranes, storks and herons lead the way of life of typical collectors, eating in most cases abundant, but infertile parts of certain plants. But there are so-called hunters. Their diet includes hard-to-reach, but the most nutritious animal feed. In this sense, such birds can be conditionally divided into "predators" and "herbivores".

A wading bird with long legs is not for nothing that it looks like. The fact is that one of the important moments in the search for food for these birds is the expansion of their visual field. Birds, who in the marshy areas are looking for rhizomes of plants, shoots, large insects, lizards, amphibians and small rodents, it is very important to have high growth. This greatly expands the review. That's why these creatures are so big.

Cranes

Typical representatives of the above described form of life are cranes. Depending on their kind, these birds prefer a different diet. For example, black cranes are mainly herbivorous: sedge seeds, marsh flowers, young shoots of swampy thickets - this is the basis for feeding such birds throughout the summer. Already by August, the diet of crane vegetarians is replenished with berries (cranberries, cranberries, blueberries). Their abundance can be found in taiga marshes.

In addition to black cranes, Siberian cranes also inhabit the marshes - white cranes. This swamp bird with long legs prefers to eat roots and rhizomes, sedge sprouts, etc. Sterkh with pleasure eat and feed animals: insects, eggs of birds, frogs, lizards, etc. Another species of bog-water birds is the gray cranes. The range of their feed is quite wide and subject to various changes depending on the season.

Herons and storks

They are secretly called the queen of the marshes. The heron is, perhaps, the most famous and widespread wader of the world with long legs. Often, next to the herons, you can observe the storks, but they are not so devoted to the marsh swamps as herons. Outwardly, both herons and storks resemble cranes, but such similarity is not at all evidence of their close evolutionary relationship. In addition, herons and storks significantly differ from cranes in the choice of feeds: their diet consists solely of animals.

The most famous species of herons are gray, red and white. Within its family, it is the largest swamp bird with long legs, living in such extreme conditions. Such herons in search of their favorite food - frogs - prefer to constantly wander in the water or spend hours idle in the swamp in complete immobility. Only in this way is it possible to catch a fat amphibian with greater probability. Storks are less patient. They prefer to be more in flight than in a wet swamp.

By the way, the beak of the queen of the marshes is a real lethal weapon, and powerful and long legs allow these birds to search for food not only on land (for example, snakes, small rodents), but also in shallow water, where large herons go along the belly. The most famous stork is white. In general, his way of life does not differ from that of herons and cranes.