TWO GRACKLES AND A SNAIL

Here and there rocky areas cut across the sandy and extend to the water's edge. While visiting such a place I see two Great-tailed Grackles land on the sand near the rocks. Then one grackle flies into the rocks and for about five seconds hovers over a pool of water caught there and returns to the sand. The same maneuver is repeated about a dozen times, with the one grackle in the sand simply watching the other.

Finally the pool-visiting grackle does something different. It snatches a snail from the pool, carries it to a boulder and deposits it atop the rock, but the snail rolls off the rock and the grackle flies away, and the bird on the sand just watches the whole thing.

Then the pool-visiting grackle returns, takes another snail, lands atop the same rock, but this time holds the snail with a foot as it pounds the snail with its beak, and the sand-percher just watches.

And then the two birds fly off, leaving me with the very strong impression that a class has just been given on how to look for snails in rocky pools, and then smash the snails and eat them. To my eyes the student didn't show much promise, but I suspect that during the next class things may go a little better.