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American Dipper — printable fact sheet
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Animal Fact Sheet
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American Dipper
Cinclus mexicanus
The dipper is North America's only aquatic songbird, and it does something no other passerine does: it walks straight into a cold mountain torrent and forages on the bottom, gripping the rocks with strong claws and using its wings to hold itself down or to swim. Its kit is entir…
Did you know?
- Unlike most songbirds, the American Dipper can swim and even walk along the bottom of swift streams, using its wings for balance underwater.
- The bobbing "dip" that gives it its name may be a visual signal that carries against a noisy, moving background where a call would be drowned out. Dippers are strongly tied to clean, well-oxygenated water and vanish from streams polluted by sediment or metals, making them a live indicator of stream health. They eat mainly caddisfly and mayfly larvae prised off the undersides of stones, and will take small fish and eggs.
What I learned
Draw the american dipper
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