Brown Along Stream Banks

I stopped along a creek in Lancaster county farmland one late afternoon in May. The stream bank was lined and shaded by large riparian trees, including sycamores, silver maples, ash-leafed maples, and black walnuts. During the few minutes I was there I saw a Mallard hen with several ducklings on the water, a pair of Spotted Sandpipers dancing on the muddy shore, and a few Northern Rough-winged Swallows cruising low over the water to catch flying insects. These birds and other species are mostly brown, that camouflages them around waterways. Their habitats make creatures the way they are.

The brown mottled female Mallards and Wood Ducks and their young are hard to see on the water, in the shadows under overhanging tree limbs along a waterway shoreline. That coloring protects them from hawks and other predators. 

Spotted Sandpipers, Killdeer plovers, and Song Sparrows move along muddy shores in comparative safety because of their brown feathering on top. They are in that niche to eat invertebrates.

Northern Rough-winged Swallows are brown because they nest in holes they dig themselves in taller stream banks. These swallows fly over the adjoining waterway to catch invertebrates. 

Cedar Waxwings and Eastern Phoebes perch in trees hanging over the waterway as they watch for flying insects that they catch in mid-air. The waxwings nest among the twigs of the trees while the phoebes raise young on support beams under small bridges. 

Muskrats and mink live along streams and are brown like the stream banks, for camouflage. Muskrats dig burrows at the water line and mink commandeer some muskrat burrows after killing and eating the muskrats.

When along stream banks, look for some of these camouflaged critters!

Photo courtesy of Kaw Valley Heritage Alliance