Wood stork - not the baby carrier I was expecting.

Main:  Wood stork flying near Fort Lauderdale.  Inset:  Sydney, Australia (zoo).

You know the image - a bundle of joy, wrapped in a white cloth with a knot, being carried by a stork.  The wood stork is the only stork native to North America, so it would be this one showing up at the expectant couple's door with the crying infant here.  That would be quite a sight.  

With a bald head, a five foot wingspan, and a long, recurved bill, the wood stork is an image from prehistoric times.  Although it is not a carrion feeder like other bald-headed birds (vultures), it certainly presents that way in mind.  I can imagine a terrified mother attempting to retrieve her newly-delivered baby from the maw of this foreboding creature.  "No thanks", she says.  "I think I'll have my baby the other way."  That's how maternity wards were invented.

In all seriousness, wood storks are not carrion feeders, but rather eat invertebrates and small vertebrates that they catch with their imposing bills.  They wade through water with their bills slightly open, using specialized tactolocation sensors located on the structure's inside edge.  When something touches it, say a fleeing fish, a signal causes the jaws to snap shut.  This is the amazing part.  The reflex, for that is what it is, happens in less than 25 milliseconds.  For reference, an eye blink is about 100 ms, an airbag deploys in 20-50 ms, and it's the time it takes sound to travel 30 feet.  It's also faster than Mohamad Ali's punch when he was at his best.

They typically rely on their bill's sensitivity to locate food, but they can also search for prey by sight (see inset).  This is by far the exception to the norm.  The storks prefer shallow pools that have low visibility due to suspended solids.  They use their feet to disturb potential prey, which flee in all directions, some into the bird's awaiting bill.  Cool.

Thanks for reading.

Eric Svendsen     www.ericspix.com