TGVG Blog

The Little Pretender

The Great Outdoors | April 1, 2018
killdeer

By Jackie Scharfenberg, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources

“Kill-deer!” That’s my mate telling me his trick worked. A fox caught a whiff of our nest scrape here on the ground. First, he tried calling loudly, bobbing up and down, and running away, but that fox kept creeping towards the nest. Next, he pretended to have a broken wing and hobbled in front of the fox leading it away from the nest. When he got to a safe distance, he flew off leaving behind a disappointed fox. If it had been a cow or horse, he would have puffed himself up, spread his tail over his head, and run at the beast trying to keep it from stomping our eggs. To search for other predators like cats, dogs, raccoons, skunks, opossums, snakes, crows, or hawks, we bob up and down looking like we just hiccupped.

Oh my! I forgot my manners with that fox scare! We are killdeer (Charadrius vociferous), members of the plover (a type of shorebird) family. We have round heads, large eyes, and longish bills. Check out our brown backs and white undersides with the two black breast stripes. Look closely to see our orange eye rings and our butterscotch-colored butts as we fly.

We make a lot of noise, so most people know us by our shrill, wailing “kill-deer” call. Some folks call us the “tattler,” because when disturbed, we fly overhead in circles calling loudly and announcing to all the presence of an intruder.

Our Habitat

Though we belong to the shorebird group, most killdeer live far away from water. We prefer wide-open spaces with less than one-inch tall plants. Think of mudflats, sandbars, grass fields, airports, golf courses, big lawns, parking lots, and athletic fields.

Mating

This spring my mate wooed me with his floating, wavering flight. He did this with slow, deep wing beats and his repetitive “kill-deer” cry. Next, we did the scrape ritual in which the male lowers his breast to the bare ground and scrapes a shallow depression with his feet. Finally, as the approving female, I lowered my head to takes his place. This ritual concluded with the male standing (body tilted slightly forward and tail raised and spread) and calling repeatedly. Wow! What a guy!

Our Young

After mating, I laid my four dark-brown speckled, buff-colored eggs in the best of the several ground scrapes my mate made. We take turns incubating the eggs for 22-28 days. Every time we leave the nest, we add some light-colored object like a pebble, shell, stick or trash to it. The chicks hatch covered in buffy down with a single black breast band; they are ready to walk once their feathers dry. We will tend to them until they fledge after 25 days, but they must feed themselves. Here in Wisconsin, we only raise one brood each year.

Our Diet

We forage on the ground for all sorts of tasty treats including earthworms, snails, crayfish, grasshoppers, beetles, aquatic insect larvae, and other invertebrates. We may hunt frogs or eat dead minnows.

The next time you’re in an open area, don’t be surprised if we tattle on you – “kill-deer, kill-deer!”

Photo by Alan D. Wilson

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