Amazing colorful birds – golden bee-eaters – have flown to the Tuzlovsky Limany National Nature Park (Odesa region). This was reported by Ivan Rusev, a doctor of biological sciences and an employee of the park.
“The common golden bee-eater, having returned from Africa, flies through the Tuzlovsky Limany National Nature Park in search of insects and is already actively looking for housing on the cliffs of reservoirs,” the scientist said.
The common golden bee-eater (Merops apiaster) is a bird of the bee-eater family. In Ukraine, this is a nesting, migratory species. The birds have very bright and characteristic colors.
The golden bee-eaters feed on a variety of insects, which they catch on the fly. Their main prey is a variety of hymenoptera – bees, wasps, bumblebees, as well as flying beetles, dragonflies, cicadas, etc. This bird catches insects with the tip of its beak to avoid the sting, then crushes the prey on a branch or kills it with several blows. It is interesting that the golden bee-eater became the “heroine” of the Ukrainian poet and writer of “The Shot Renaissance” Mike Johansen. In his novel “The Journey of the Scientist Doctor Leonardo and His Future Mistress Alchesta to Slobozhanskaya Switzerland” (1930), Johansen describes the beauty of the multi-colored bee-eater and its singing.
