The things you learn when you are looking through your photos!! I’ve spent so many hours over the last 2 months trying to catch up on processing old photos. It’s a task I thought I’d never catch up on in this lifetime, given I had photos going back…years. But I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel! Last night I was processing photos from a trip to the Black Hills of South Dakota when I got to a series of Common Nighthawk photos I took at Wind Cave National Park.
Common Nighthawks had been something of a photographic nemesis for me. I see them in flight all the time, but have you tried to photograph a nighthawk in flight?!?! Yikes…they don’t fly straight! They do often perch during the day, but in my part of South Dakota, that’s typically in a tree, where they blend right in. However, out west, they might perch on a rock, a fence post, or…a barbed wire fence. Last June, late in the evening, I saw several Common Nighthawks flying around, and I tried in vain to photograph them. However, when I gave up and started driving I came across a Common Nighthawk perched on a barbed wire fence.
I spent probably 30 minutes watching that one bird! What a treat! FINALLY some good photos of a Common Nighthawk, not only of a bird at rest, but a bird opening that massive mouth and calling several times! I did post a few quick photos on social media, but then forgot about them for 9 months…until last night. When looking through the photos, something really stood out on a few of them. What was wrong with one of the bird’s toes!?!? I’d never seen anything like it:
I started poking around and quickly found out it’s called a “pectinate” toe, which is thought to function as a grooming device. Evidently there are a few types of birds that have this feature, including not only “goatsucker” species like the Common Nighthawk, but also Herons and Egrets. On some species they’re found on both feet, but in some species, like this Common Nighthawk, they’re only found on one foot.
Makes me wonder…are they all “left footed”? Are there are “right-footed” birds in terms of their combs? I haven’t been able to find that answer, but I did find this blog that does indeed attempt to show that yes, the birds can and do use that toe to tend to their plumage.
Very cool!! But the question is…HOW cool!?!? Which has the greater “cool” factor? A Common Nighthawk with it’s own built-in comb on it’s toe? Or the millions of US kids who grew up in the 80s, with the standard and oh-so-necessary comb sticking out of their back blue jeans pocket?
