"F" For Flightless Feathered Friends on Fernandina

                                                                                                                                                                 Photo by Richard Schear

Flightless cormorants (Phalacrocorax harrisi), also known as Galapagos cormorants, are unique because they are the only cormorants to have lost the ability to fly. This bird is the largest cormorant on the planet today, also one of the world's rarest birds, and the subject of an active conservation program.

After diving for food (fish, eels and small octopi) in the shallow water no more than 100 meters off the shores of only two islands, Isabela and Fernandina, the cormorants dry their short wings in the sun (as shown in the picture above) because their feathers are not waterproof.

In the Wikipedia photo to the right, we can see the bird's upper coloring is blackish, its lower parts brown, and its eye turquoise.
I wish my eyes were turquoise.

Posted for the letter F in ABC Wednesday,
an alphabetic meme hosted weekly by Mrs. Nesbitt's
team of fantastic photographers.


To see how other people around the world used the letter F,
please click
HERE!

B is for bicycle, backbone, borken ...huh? borken??

Bicycles in Beijing... cyclists in this Chinese metropolis are fearless, even when smog covers the city.
This photo, taken on our trip to China in 2008, was retouched to remove some of the smog, but it still isn't clear.

The backbone of a whale, just off the tourist pathway on the island of Fernandina in the Galapagos chain.
In this World Heritage Site, tourists are not allowed to touch any of the plants and animals, or their remains.
Tourists are always accompanied by a naturalist guide who informs them and reminds them not to touch.

Sometimes Dick's work involves him traveling to northern Alberta to see clients. Stopping to refuel on a recent trip,
he saw this sign on the gas pump. He couldn't use his credit card at the pump, so he had to go inside to pay.
(I'm so bad, I just love typos, except when I make them myself.)

Barcelona's beautiful waterfront, with the statue of Christopher Columbus.

The letter B appears twice, in this cloud above the island of Kauai, Hawaii.
Photos by Kay Davies and Richard Schear.

Posted for ABC Wednesday's letter B.

To see where others around the world have found the letter B, or how they've used it, please click

HERE!

A very special kind of skywatching

Blue-footed boobies (above) and a flightless cormorant (left) exhibit a behavior known as sky-pointing. Male blue-foots sky-point as part of their courtship rituals, and also to impress other males with their superiority.
The flightless cormorant, found only on the adjacent Galapagos islands of Fernandina and Isabela, is shown here sky-pointing to dry his feathers following an underwater courtship or a search for food in the shallow waters of the islands' shorelines. The Galapagos cormorant is the only cormorant in the world that doesn't fly.

Photos 1 and 3
by Kay Davies

Photos 2 and 4
by Karina Lopez



Posted for the Sky Watch Friday meme