- When visiting Arctic Tern colonies I have noticed dead chicks laying beside fish that would be much too large for the chicks to swallow.
- Arctic tern parents typically do not break up fish or regurgitate food for the chicks.
- So the size of fish they bring for their chicks is extremely important.
- This video illustrates how this can happen.
- One could speculate that the parent with the fish too large for the chicks had another motive since it ended up eating it.
- Eventually the other parent brings the right size fish for the chick.
- How or why does this sort of thing happen?
- It could be related to the inexperience of the parent. Perhaps this is their or its first time nesting.
- It could also be related to the availability of certain size fish.
Arctic Tern feeds its chick too large of a fish from Bob Armstrong on Vimeo.