Tuesday, April 19, 2016

BIRDS GOTTA FLY?

"Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly…"





I hate to say it, but Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein got it wrong in the latter part of their lyric for the Show Boat tune, "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man." Of course, they probably weren't all that familiar with nuthatches.

If you're a nuthatch, flying is optional…as is gravity. 

Should a nuthatch wish to get from one portion of a forked tree trunk to another, it could hippity-hop down one and ratchety-climb back up the other. Or it could just keep its wings tucked, fling itself in the intended general direction, and trust the rest to luck and levitation. 

Nope…birds don't always gotta fly! Not if you're a nuthatch!   
  

2 comments:

Out To Pasture said...

I'll be watching those nuthatches a bit closer from now on. Not only cute, they also have super powers!

Grizz………… said...

Out to Pasture…

Yup, zany little birds that can float as well as fly. Dangerous critters indeed!