Behavior

Description

Resting

Resting of waterbird comprised of loafing, sleeping and roosting.

1. Loafing Waterbird may be simply standing or sitting down on the ground or shows a variety of fatigue or relaxing moves.

2. Sleeping is with standing or sitting on ground or holding themselves motionless in water. Eyes are closed with neck held in normal or retracted position or with the bill tucked under scapular.

3. Roosting-birds choose a site to sleep and rest as trees.

Feeding

All the behaviors associated with actively searching for food, capturing it, and manipulating or ingesting

1. Pecking, penetration of substrate by less than one-quarter of bill length to catch prey items. Use visual means for detecting prey items in water’s edge or muddy areas out of water.

2. Probing, penetration of substrate by more than one-quarter of bill length using tactile means to discover buried prey.

3. Ploughing-moving slightly opened bills rapidly through the water in shallow waters. The bird immerses the lower half of its bill in water at a shallow angle and run forward very quickly.

4. Sweeping, side to side movements of bill introduced in water

5. Stabbing, walk slowly through shallow water searching for prey or stood motionless watching for the prey and stabbing it when found.

6. Plunging head and neck enter in water to catch prey

7. Diving

8. Plung diving

9. Up ending

10. Head submergence

11. Filtering

Locomotion

Moving from one place to another by walking, running (speed faster than walking with its head held high and extended) swimming (the waterbird is completely in the water and moving either treading or propelling forward legs) and flying (the waterbird rises up out of the substrate) into flight, and lands back in the substrate or continues flying out of sight).

Comfort activities

Comfort activities are further divided into preening, bathing ant stretching.

1. Preening, care of body surface and relative activities which involve the contact between the bill and the feathers.

2. Bathing, Dipping the head in water accompanied by the beating of wings as also by short dives.

3. Stretching.

Agonistic

This range from simple threat and avoidance to energetically costly chasing in pursuit flights.

Alert

Waterbird in the alert mode, remains motionless, with its eyes open and with the neck fully extended in a posture of standing on the ground or water. Also usually held their heads further up stretched and watched and listened for potential intruders, predators or disturbance.

Other

Any other behavior that the animal is exhibiting that is not described within the above ethogram categories.