As we walked by some of the former shrimp ponds in an abandoned aquaculture farm, we approached a scene I easily overlooked until Julian asked me to document what was happening. We saw an egret struggling to swallow something, and I simply assumed this was what a hungry egret looked like. However, Julian’s surprise and the wingbeat that seemed to come out of the egret’s beak revealed a more uncommon scene. Through our binoculars, we soon realized that the egret was struggling to swallow another waterbird—to Julian’s fascination, a seemingly undocumented behavior for this species. Skeptical of what he suspected he was witnessing, Julian got as close as he could to the scene and took photos while I made short videos from afar, worried that I would disrupt the egret and its prey if I moved any closer. (read more...)