All together

The Clark’s grebes on a local lake in San Diego, California, USA, hadn’t nested for a few years, possibly because of the unusually hot and dry weather California had been experiencing.
Then in 2017 California had twice its normal annual rainfall. With the lakes full, the grebes started to build nests and lay eggs again. They build floating nests at the edge of shallow water among the reeds or rushes. The chicks hitch a cosy ride on a parent’s back soon after hatching. This picture was taken a few days after a storm which sadly washed away almost all of the grebes' nests. I had been out on a boat for many days and hours, scanning the surface, looking for grebes and, today just as the light was fading, I spotted them, the survivors.