FBML Essentials

Colophon

The animal on the cover of FBML Essentials is a white-throated dipper (Cinclus cinclus), an aquatic songbird found throughout Europe, the UK, and the Middle East. It is especially common in Britain and Ireland. Around seven inches long, the dipper is round, squat, and short-tailed. Adult white-throated dippers have dark plumage and a prominent white breast, with a reddish band above a black belly. Young dippers are gray and lack the reddish band.

Dippers live near fast-flowing streams and rivers, and they swim underwater to hunt for small fish and shrimps. Some people believe that the bird walks along the bottom of a river, using its wings and strong feet to keep itself submerged, but by most accounts the dipper swims, using its wings to “fly” underwater. Like other waterfowl, the dipper has a translucent eyelid called a nictitating membrane that protects its eye when it dives. Oils produced from a gland above its tail keep the dipper warm and make its feathers nearly waterproof.

The dipper’s nest is made from straw and moss, about the size and shape of a soccer ball. This nest is usually built into the hollow of a rock, in a crevice under a bridge or stone wall, or on an overhanging branch. When the bird is perched on dry land, it makes a unique bobbing motion by bending and straightening its knees and cocking its tail. The dipper gets its name from this habit of bobbing, not from its water diving. No one knows for certain why the bird dips in this way, but biologists believe ...