“This award-winning photograph was taken by Owen Deutsch in Fox Lake, IL and is a North American Nature Photography Association (NANPA) 2011 Top 10 Showcase Winner. This Bald Eagle was chasing the Great Blue Heron away from the eggs in her nest. It wasn’t trying to kill the Heron or she would have done so long before this once in a lifetime shot was captured.” (Owen Deutsch / owendeutsch.com)Asian koels are found in S Asia, China, and SE Asia. They are brood parasite that lays its eggs in the nests of crows and other hosts that raise their young. (Anantha Murthy)Cape parrots are endemic to South Africa and with little food left in their natural habitat they are struggling to bring back population levels since a collapse in the 1980s. (Rodnick Clifton Biljon / Cape Parrot Project)Snow geese breed north of the timberline in Greenland, Canada, Alaska, and the NE tip of Siberia, wintering in warmer parts of North America from SW British Columbia through parts of the United States to Mexico. Photographed here in Ontario (Canada). global ppoulation is increasing after decades of hunting to over 5 million. (Nina Stavlund)Blue-throated barbets are distributed across the Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia. Photographed here in the Garo hills in Meghalaya (NE India). (Israel Momin)Black-naped monarchs breed across tropical S Asia from India and Sri Lanka E to Indonesia and the Philippines, preferring thick forests and other well-wooded habitat types. Photographed here in the W Ghats (India). (Shishir Saksena)Least terns breed in N America and locally in N South America, migrating to Central America, the Caribbean and South America. Photographed here in Quintana (Texas, USA). (Dan Pancamo / blog.pancamo.com)Eurasian jays occur over a vast distributional range from W Europe and NW Africa to the Indian Subcontinent and further to the E seaboard of Asia and down into SE Asia. (Lennart Hessel / www.lensman.se)Volcano hummingbirds breed only in the mountains of Costa Rica and Chiriqui, Panama. During the breeding season the males perch conspicuously in open areas with flowers and defend their feeding territories aggressively with diving displays. (Nina Stavlund)Greater racket-tailed drongos extend from the W Himalayas to the E Himalayas and Mishmi Hills in the foothills. They are also found on the islands of Borneo and Java. Photographed here in Kerala (India). (Kamal Hari Menon)Greater flamingos are the most widespread species of flamingo found in parts of Africa, S Asia (coastal regions of Pakistan and India), and S Europe (including Spain, Albania, Turkey, Greece, Cyprus, Portugal, Italy and the Camargue region of France). (Guido Muratore)Malachite sunbirds are found throughout Africa, the Middle East, and SE Asia. They are also called “Green Sugarbirds”. (Louis Groenewald)Ring-billed gulls breed near lakes, rivers or the coast in Canada and the N United States, preferring nest colonies on the ground, often on islands. They are migratory and most move south to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of North America, also the Great Lakes. (Nina Stavlund)The little-known silver-breasted broadbill occurs at a range of elavations across its distributional range. Living between 800–2,000 metres (2,600–6,600 ft) in Sumatra, but dropping to 300–700 m (980–2,300 ft) in China. (Gururaj Moorching)Snowy egrets breed in large inland and coastal wetlands from the lower Great Lakes and SW United States to South America. Photographed here in the Florida Keys Wild Bird Center. (J. Bernardo Sánchez)Spot-billed pelicans breeds in S Asia from S Pakistan across India east to Indonesia, preferring large inland and coastal waters, especially large lakes. (Yogi Badri)Ultramarine flycatchers are common breeding migrants to W Himalayas from Jammu, Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh to Uttarakhand, wintering in S India. (Debojit Deb)White-throated kingfishers are common throughout their wide distributed in Eurasia from Bulgaria, Turkey, W Asia all the way to the Indian Subcontinent and the Philippines. Photographed here on Salt Lake (West Bengal, India). (Raj Sarkar)Cape grassbirds breed in S Africa in South Africa, Lesotho, Mozambique and Swaziland with an isolated population in E Zimbabwe. They prefer coastal and mountain fynbos and long, rank grass on mountain slopes or in river valleys. Photographed here in the Western Cape (South Africa). (Trevor Kleyn / www.trevorkleyn.com)Great spotted woodpeckers are distributed throughout Europe and N Asia, and are usually resident year-round except in the colder parts of their range. Nesting trees chosen by this woodpecker almost invariably have soft heartwood and tough sapwood, often due to parasites or diseases that weaken the heartwood only. (Lennart Hessel / www.lensman.se)Puffins shed the colorful outer parts of their bills after the breeding season, leaving a smaller and duller beak. Their short wings are adapted for swimming with a flying technique under water. In the air, they need to beat their wings rapidly (up to 400 times per minute) to stay airborne. (Samuele Parentella / www.samueleparentella.it)Verditer flycatchers are found in the Indian subcontinent (especially in the Lower Himalayas). They are interesting among flycatchers as they forage above the canopy and perch on electric wires or exposed tree top branches. (Debojit Deb)Spotted eagle-owls are common in southern African cities where they hunt rats and mice at night between buildings and in open grasslands. They are targeted by the pet trade, as they make amicable pets. (Denis Smit)Malachite kingfishers are small river specialists that dart just above the surface from low perches to catch fish, tadpoles, frogs and insects on the water’s surface. They are found throughout SubSaharan Africa. (Chris Krog)
