The Whiskered Terns of Lake Kerkini

I didn?t have any free time lately. Setting-up my website was stealing my last free hours and as a result, the photos from my latest visit to Lake Kerkini one month ago were left neglected in my hard disks. I am starting to sort them out now, selecting the keepers and store them to the proper places in my disks.

Although I have visited Kerkini several times over the last years, every time I go there, I find something new and interesting.

Trying to choose what was the highlight of this last visit is not an easy task. However the first thing that comes to my mind is observing a large group of Whiskered Terns trying to establish a nesting colony. The males were constantly hunting frogs and fish in the shallow waters of the lake. They were flying over the water searching for prey, and as soon as they spotted something, they performed a very swift dive for the catch.

The effort was successful most of the times and after that, the prey was brought to the waiting female as a “wedding gift”. The area chosen was passionately defended against every other bird in the area. I saw them chasing away all kinds of other birds, from Coots up to the huge for their size Grey Herons.

I hope that they have managed to establish their colony, because I have heard that they are not successful every year. I hope that this year they made it.

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