September 14 was a pretty miserable day - cold and raining hard. Numerous puddles and the wet ground fooled a red-necked grebe into thinking the log yard at Hinton Wood Products sawmill was a water body. Not so, and once on the ground the grebe wasn't able to get airborne again. Grebes and loons must have water deep enough to get a run at if for liftoff. They patter across the water surface building speed using both their wings and their feet. For this purpose, the shallow puddles in the log yard wouldn't do.
Fortunately for the grebe, Dave Wallace, Neil Holder, and Morris Archibald came to the rescue. They caught the bird in a fishing net and deposited it in a cardboard box. Of course the bird didn't know they had good intentions and was quite indignant about the whole affair. A bit of a rodeo, according to the guys. After a short drive Morris opened the box at the Beaver Boardwalk and the grebe got a new start on Maxwell Lake. It was gone a few days later, probably carrying on with fall migration.
Dave Wallace took the photos with this post. The first shows the bird on the ground, and the second shows Morris releasing the grebe at Maxwell Lake.
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