21.07.2004

The Young Storks are lifting off

The white stork brood season approaches its fulfilment - young storks fledge everywhere. Every day now, the three young "Internet Storks" at Vetschau/Spree Forest practice hard and make more use of their wings. They no longer just jump aroung in the nest, but lift themselves with strong strokes of their wings from one to three feet off the nest. Today, in the morning of July 21st, two of the young storks ventured out, circling the eyrie on their first flight. In the coming days most young ones will start their ever wider and longer practice flights. The first excursions are a dangerous phase for the young storks, for they are still awkward, miss the landing place, hit obstacles, or fly into with danger loaded medium voltage power poles.

Soon the young storks will no longer be different from their parents in size. In fact, the young ones will surpass the weight of the parent storks at the end of their nest time. However, they will quickly loose their "baby fat" when the strenuous days of practice flights and excursions into the ever wider surrounding countryside begin. Nevertheless something differentiates the young ones from the parent storks in their first year of life: The beaks are not yet red and slowly change from black to brownish red and finally to shining red of mature storks. The legs, also, do not yet show the deep red of the old storks. When temperatures soar above 85° F and it is sunny, storks chalk their legs with excrement. This protects against overheating. Time is short! Comes the middle of August, the storks' nest will be deserted. Anyone who wishes to observe the stork family in action at the nest must hurry with his/her visit to the White Stork Information Centre at Vetschau/Spree Forest.

NABU-Project Leader
Winfried Boehmer

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