Anhinga

The anhinga sometimes called snakebird, darter, American darter or water turkey is a water bird of the warmer areas of the Americas. The word anhinga derives from Tupi's Brazilian language and means Devil's or Serpent's Creature. The origin of the word snakebird becomes evident when swimming: just the neck emerges above the surface, so that the bird looks like a snake about to attack. They have no visible nares (nostrils), and breathe only through their epiglottis. Anhinga populations are found all over the world in warm, shallow waters. Also birds that live in the far north and south of their range migrate, based on the available weather and sunshine.

Anhingas can travel to the equator during the winter, although this range is "determined by the amount of sunshine to fuel the cold birds" Anhingas was present in the United States as far north as the states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin but not in their usual range. Anhingas kettles sometimes migrate with other birds, and have been known as black paper-like gliders. The male is a glossy black-green with eyes, base wing, and glossy tail black-blue. The tip of the tail is strewn with white feathers. The head and neck back have elongated feathers described as light purple-white or black. On the upper back the body and wings are outlined or streaked in white.

Similar to the male, except for having a pale grey-buff or light brown head, back, and upper chest, the female anhinga has. The lower chest or breast is a chestnut colour, as relative to the male the female has a darker back. The hatchling begins bald but grows tan down within a few days of hatching. The tan-down will be substituted by white down in two weeks ' time. Three weeks after hatching emerge the first juvenile feathers. Juveniles are generally grey, and normally breed first after the second or third season. This bird is often mistaken for the double-crested cormorant because of its similar size and appearance, though the two birds can be identified by their tails and bills. The anhinga tail is larger than the cormorant tail, and much broader. The bill for the anhinga is pointed while the bill for the cormorant has a hook-tip. Anhingas dive on their webbed paws, pursuing their prey, shrimp, underwater and spear their prey by rapidly extending out their arms. They come up to feed and suck shrimp.

Unlike ducks, ospreys and pelicans which brush their feathers with wax from their uropygial gland, the anhinga does not have waterproof feathers. Their feathers get soaked after inclusion in the water. Therefore they can not stay afloat on water for long stretches of time. Their thick bones, wetted plumage, and neutral water buoyancy allow them to immerse themselves fully and search for underwater preys. The anhinga can't fly on moist fur. The anhinga can have difficulty when it tries to fly when its wings are warm, flapping vigorously while "playing" on the surface. The anhinga stands like cormorants with spreading wings and opening feathers in a semi-circular shape to dry their feathers and absorb heat. They face off from the sun to dry their feathers.

Anhingas lose relatively fast body heat, and their pose allows them trap solar energy from the sun to mitigate the high rate of heat loss. Since a drying anhinga resembles a male turkey, it was referred in a colloquial way to be the water turkey or swamp turkey. Anhingas feed variable scale wetland trout. The anhinga is protected in the United States under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. The number of individual anhingas has not been calculated, although it is presumed that the extent of their occurrence in its global range of 15,000,000 km2 is of least importance.