This starling and prairie dog will not back down an inch as they have a fearsome stand-off over who gets to eat a nut. The cute rodent and the adult bird locked horns at a US zoo earlier this month to go to face to face to see who would stare the other out and grab the food. Despite the dog picking up the nut moments before, ready to chew down on his tasty find for lunch, the starling flew in to challenge him. And it was the feathered thief who won the battle as it simply pecked the nut out of the hands of the white tailed dog and flew off to target its next meal. Photographer Scott Spaeth,42, grabbed the fascinating stand-off at St Louis Zoo, Missouri, and said it was commonplace for the starlings to wait for their furry friends to find food and then steal it from them. He said: "The two of them were facing off to see who got the prairie dog's lunch. "As so often in life the cunning one won and the starling got the prize. Not that the prairie dog seemed to care much, there was plenty more food laying around everywhere. "The prairie dogs eat a variety of food pellets and fresh vegetables, and they seem to know that there's no threat of shortage. "So when the starlings, who are not indigenous to North America, come and take the food right out of the prairie dog's paws, the reaction is to simply pick up another piece of food and continue eating." Scott explained the birds in the vicinity of the zoo have such power over the smaller animals around them, they always win the fights over food. He said: "What I find interesting about the starlings is they will not pick up the food from the ground. "If a prairie dog picks up a new piece of food too close to the starling that just stole from him, the starling will drop the stolen food to go after the prairie dog again. "It's just an incredible sight, and I've never seen anything like it elsewhere, outside of humans that is.
A pair of BEAUTIFUL rescue sea turtles spot their catch in the waters of the Great Barrier Reef .
FEAST your eyes on the £500K coin-covered Range Rover that could be the world’s most blinged-out car .
A woman has shed half her body weight after undergoing a gastric sleeve op to shrink her stomach .
A woman has told how she saved the life of her own rapist after he overdosed on pills shortly after attacking her .
A woman with a rare condition that means she collapses every time she laughs fears she may have passed the rare illness onto her young son .
A kingfisher’s bright blue and orange feathers glisten in the sunlight as the bird dives into a lake .
STEPFORD wives from the 1950's and 60's are performing history's most sexist exercise programme .
A coroner stunned an inquest into a honeymooner who died abroad today by asking her husband if he was involved in her drugs death .
A world's first restaurant has opened in Canada, where having your order fall on deaf ears is a good thing .
This was the chaotic scene when the driver of a 4x4 vehicle became periously trapped under his vehicle for an HOUR when it overturned after a crash on a busy motorway .
Going for long rides through vast fields together, this twosome share an unbreakable bond .