Pausing to rest, the green heron in the above photo is performing an extremely important job for a bird, preening. Most birds have a preen gland, or uropygial gland, on their back, at the base of the tail just forward of where the tail feathers enter the body. You can’t see it unless you move the feathers aside, but its there. The gland contains an oily substance used to clean and coat the bird’s feathers. The bird reaches back with itsRead more
Posts tagged: #Great Blue Heron
GBH
If you’ve been down to the Wetlands within the last several months you may have seen a great blue heron (GBH) standing by a rock (boulder) out in the water some eighty or ninety feet from the Main Wetlands Overlook. You would have been looking at our current resident GBH. I say current resident because I don’t know if it’s the same heron that I’ve been seeing, just about daily, for nearly seven years now. Without physically markingRead more
Summertime Sightings
Top Photo: Gray hairstreak. With the summer just about gone (for me, fall starts around mid August), I thought I’d give you a pictorial update on some of what’s being seen on our 84 acre campus here at the Museum. Last month I mentioned that there were again woolly aphids enjoying the sap of one of our alders in the Wetlands in Explore the Wild. The colonies are growing considerably and many bees and wasps are visiting the sight, includingRead more
What Happened to the Green Herons in the Wetlands
I’ve seen zero activity this past week at either of the green heron nests in our Wetlands. I saw a heron flying away from the Wetlands Saturday (6/21) and one flew in to fish late in the day Wednesday (6/25). What has happened to the two heron nests that were started, completed and in which eggs had been deposited, at least in the nest visible from the Main Wetlands Overlook. The other nest, which is difficult to see, was placed in aRead more
Coping with the heat?
If you’re wondering how the wildlife is coping with this 100+ weather, here’s how our GBH is behaving. I’ve seen Great Blue Herons in this pose before, but I always thought it was a way of gaining heat, not cooling oneself off. I think, however, it also serves to help straighten curled feathers, but still a strange behavior in this heat. The bird was facing the sun so it seems the wings would to act as a parabolic reflector. If that strange posture wasn’tRead more
The Bounty
The bounty of fish is gone. The shiners that once lay within easy reach of all who munch fish in our little Wetlands have either dispersed or been dispatched. No more can the egret and herons pick off shiners at their leisure at the edge of the Wetlands. They now have to work for every fish, tadpole, frog, or crayfish that they catch, which is probably why egret and heron are nowhere to be seen. It’s been just about aRead more
What’s the last thing a fish sees…
before it’s snatched up by a heron? The heron in the above photo is actually looking down at me, not a fish, but you get the idea. The heron was in a pine tree above the path in Explore the Wild. What’s interesting about the photo is that it clearly illustrates the fact that herons have binocular vision and can see objects beyond and below their bills, helpful if you make your living plucking fish out of the water. AmongRead more
The Harrying of the Ardeidae
For the past several years we’ve had a Great Blue Heron (GBH) in the Wetlands on nearly a daily basis. It seems to be the same blue heron, or at least it behaves in the same manner each time that I see it, it’s people shy and stays on the far side of the Wetlands when people are present. Other GBHs come into our Wetlands from time to time, I’ve seen as many as three at a time foraging amongstRead more