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Black-headed gulls, bar-tailed godwits and sanderlings foraging on a beach. A mixed-species feeding flock, also termed a mixed-species foraging flock, mixed hunting party or informally bird wave, is a flock of usually insectivorous birds of different species that join each other and move together while foraging. [1]
Males and females always perform the same task in every situation. They begin perched together and the males initiate and give a sharp "chirp" vocalization to signal for the female to follow suit. When chasing birds on the ground, the females follow right behind the birds in the bushes and the males swoop in from overhead to make the kill.
This sexual difference in size is most pronounced in active species that hunt birds, such as the Accipiter hawks, in which the size difference averages 25–50%. In a majority of species, such as generalist hunters and rodent -, reptile -, fish -, and insect -hunting specialists, the dimorphism is less, usually between a 5% to 30% size difference.
Thick-knees are birds that are seen in large flocks during particular seasons in various regions of the world. [7] During the nonbreeding season, Peruvian thick-knees in Chile are reported to have an average of 22.5 birds — a mixture of adults and youngsters — in their flocks. [7]
Eagles are not used as widely in falconry as other birds of prey, due to the lack of versatility in the larger species (they primarily hunt over large, open ground), the greater potential danger to other people if hunted in a widely populated area, and the difficulty of training and managing an eagle.
Birds make use of a variety of approaches to improve the efficiency of their foraging. These include foraging in flocks which provides many eyes to seek patches rich in food while also reducing the risk of predation by increasing the efficiency of detecting predators, increasing time spent on handling food, and by reducing individual risk .
Flocking is the behavior exhibited when a group of birds, called a flock, are foraging or in flight. Sheep and goats also exhibit flocking behavior. Computer simulations and mathematical models that have been developed to emulate the flocking behaviours of birds can also generally be applied to the "flocking" behaviour of other species.
Although the term "bird of prey" could theoretically be taken to include all birds that actively hunt and eat other animals, [4] ornithologists typically use the narrower definition followed in this page, [5] excluding many piscivorous predators such as storks, cranes, herons, gulls, skuas, penguins, and kingfishers, as well as many primarily ...