A woman from the Thunder Bay, Ont., area has captured some rare close-ups of nesting robins after positioning a GoPro camera above their nest. And she learned some new things about them.
Kathy McGowan has set up digital cameras near bird nests before, she said, but this was her first time trying out her new GoPro.
She set it up in late May and took it down last week, she added.
"I caught some really cool images and videos of this pair of robins tending to each other and tending to their nest of three eggs," McGowan said.
McGowan researched how to place a camera the right way and at the right distance to not risk causing birds to abandon their nests, she said.
She positioned the GoPro on a telescopic pole that could be set up and removed in seconds.
All the same, a video posted on YouTube captures the robins cheeping loudly at her when she goes to remove the camera.
McGowan did not leave her camera in place once babies have hatched so as not to disrupt the birds from coming and going to feed their young, she said.
"I was really surprised at the quality of the pictures," she said, of her latest collection. She said she learned new things from the GoPro video.
"One thing I did learn about robins that I didn't know before is how much time the male spends at the nest," she said. "He sits on the eggs and he keeps the babies warm.… Every time he comes back, he has food. He feeds them. They're like a tag team. Then she takes off. She does her thing. She comes back, and she feeds him and feeds the babies. And when he comes back he feeds her and the babies."
"He'll clean up the nest as well," she said.