birds | Serenity Spell

Dec 2

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections

One of the birds I most enjoy watching in our wetlands and swamps is the Great Egret. It’s hard not to be captivated by these creatures — the epitome of ethereal beauty, grace and strength, they wade, stalk and fly in our waters with balletic poise. They’re the largest egret in the Old World — thus the great of their title. In the New World however, Great Blue Herons win the size competition.

To see their brilliant all-white plumage reflected on the water’s surface is always a stunning sight. These beautiful birds were hunted mercilessly towards the end of the 19th century for their gorgeous feathers — nearly to the point of extinction, their numbers decimated by 95 percent. Their breeding plumage was especially prized, and the treasured feathers were used in hats across the globe. During the breeding season, the Great Egret displays long, elegant plumes on its back, which are used in courtship displays. But with conservation measures enacted, their numbers grew throughout the 20th century. While wetland habitat loss is once again threatening their existence, these birds have a high adaptability to human habitation. Of course, the loss of wetland ecosystems remains another issue altogether for other wildlife and flora….

These egrets feed by stalking, wading in the shallow water, patiently waiting for fish — then grabbing or stabbing their hapless meal with sharp bills. I’ve also seen them dine on amphibians, reptiles, and small mammals; sometimes their eyes are larger than their stomachs.

Wading and hunting in South Florida’s protected wetlands

Great Egret Stalking Meal, Florida Wetlands

Patiently stalking a meal among the purple stalks of the aquatic plant, pickerelweed

Snagging a meal in the wetlands

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections

Nov 27

72 Comments

They Mostly Come Out at Night… Mostly: The Black-crowned Night Herons

For my fellow sci-fi aficionados, it’s a lot prettier than the critter Newt refers to in the Aliens franchise….

Black-crowned Night Herons (Nycticorax nycticorax) are the most widespread herons in the world, and can be found on all continents except Australia and Antarctica. As their name suggests, they’re most active during the dusk and night hours, resting during the day.

Juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron in the Wetlands: Learning to Hunt

Description

Compared to other herons, these guys are small, stocky, short-necked, and short-legged — averaging 23-28″ in length and 25″ in height. The adults sport their descriptive black crown and back, accompanied by light blue-grey wings and tail, and whitish underparts. Their legs and feet are yellowish-green, changing to a pinkish-red during the breeding season. During the breeding times, they’ll also grow two or three long white plumes on their heads, that will stand up during greeting and courtship displays. Males and females look alike, but the females are a bit smaller in size. The Black-crowned juveniles display a dark grey-brown plumage, with white streaks and spots. Adult plumage is reached by 3-years-old — which is also breeding time.

But my favorite part of these herons are their eyes: a brilliant bright red. And the youngsters? They have an equally gorgeous yellow stare.

Adult Black-crowned Night Heron: Look into my eyessss….

Habitat, Diet & Hunting

Black-crowned Night Herons prefer the fresh- and salt-water wetland habitats, including marine islands, swamps, rivers, canals, marshes, mangroves, and the more overgrown edges of lakes and ponds. They remain close to the water and near their favored trees, including pond apple trees, in our area — where they roost and breed.

Their diet consists primarily of fish, but Black-crowned Night Herons will also partake in frogs, insects, crayfish, mussels, squid, reptiles, rodents, and aquatic plants. They’ll also loot the eggs and nestlings of waterbirds, such as terns, herons and ibises, and hunt small birds. Feeding takes place in the shallow waters, where they grasp their prey (instead of stabbing it). It’s a common sight to witness these herons standing stock-still at the water’s edge for long periods of time, waiting for their prey to come into range. They shake their prey until it’s been stunned or killed, at which point the heron swallows it head-first. Yummy!

Juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron

Black-crowned Night Herons are solitary hunters, and feed in the early morning and at dusk. Theories of their nocturnal habits range from wishing to minimize competition for food with other waders, to avoiding harassment from other birds that are aware of the night herons’ habits of feeding on their eggs and young, and have, therefore, learned to attack night herons on sight.

Threats

In the 1960s, Black-crowned Night Herons’ populations suffered a decline that was attributed to the use of DDT. They’re also hunted for food — particularly the juveniles. Additionally these herons are killed at fish farms, where they’re seen as a nuisance. Fortunately, alternate methods for managing many of the associated “issues” with these birds have been implemented, eradicating the need to slaughter these lovely herons.

Adult Black-crowned Night Heron, Hunting in the Wetlands

As with other wading birds, habitat loss and destruction (in addition to water pollution) of their wetland habitats in more recent history have had detrimental impacts in their decreased populations.

Adult Black-crowned Night Heron, Near the Roost

SAVE THE WETLANDS and their most lovely and amazing inhabitants!

Fun Facts:

If you want to hear a Black-crowned Night heron, listen for a loud and somewhat harsh ‘Qua,’ ‘Quak,’ ‘Quark’, ‘kwark’ or ‘kwok.’
In many parts of the world, this heron is named for its calls. In the Falkland Islands, it’s referred to as quark; kwak in Dutch and Frisian; and similarly in Czech, Ukrainian, Russian, Vietnamese, Indonesian, and other languages.
Black-crowned Night Herons can live up to 30 years in captivity, and 20 years in the wild.
While hunting, these herons use a technique called “bill vibrating.” They open and close their bill rapidly in the water, which creates a disturbance that lures prey.

Part of:

Oct 31

55 Comments

The Eyes Have It

An animal’s eyes have the power to speak a great language. ―Martin Buber

In preparation of an upcoming post on Black-crowned Night Herons, and in honor of Halloween, I give you the lovely and brilliant red and orange glowing pumpkin stares of these lovely wetland waders. I’m always captivated by birds’ eyes, but some are especially striking….

An adult’s red glowing gaze

A juvenile’s changing orange sight

Oct 1

63 Comments

Gentlemen of the Wetlands

Wood storks (Mycteria americana) — or American Wood ibis — are large wading birds native to North America, found from the coast of South Carolina, throughout Florida, and west to Texas. These guys are unmistakable — standing at three-and-a-half feet tall, with a wing span of at least five feet, they’re a stately presence in our wetlands. They have heavy, long curved beaks and a nearly featherless head, and are covered in white feathers, with black feathers on the wings and tail. They can be awkward in flight, but graceful on land, daintily and slowly placing one leg in front of the next as they make their way through the shallow wetlands.

Wood stork of the Florida wetlands: A gentleman

As one might imagine given their size, Wood storks are plentiful eaters, especially during the breeding season. They use their feet to stir the bottom of the shallow waters to collect their food, including fish, crayfish, lizards, tadpoles, shrimp, frogs, insects, and baby alligator. Feeding in waters no deeper than their beak, they use a technique known as “grope feeding” — because Wood storks don’t use their vision, but rather touch, to collect food.

Wood stork “grope feeding” in the shallow waters

Sadly, this gentleman wader is endangered: In the 1930s there were an estimated 60,000 Wood storks in the United States, but only 10,000 live today, mostly due to habitat loss and/or disruption of their environments. Like so many other species, the disappearance of the Wood stork would signal the loss of a crucial component of our wetlands.

Save the wetlands!

Fun Facts:

The reflex of a Wood stork’s bill after it touches food is considered the fastest of any reflex in the vertebrate world!
A typical Wood stork greeting involves both birds raising and lowering their heads, with bills agape.
Wood stork courtship involves bill clapping. Sometimes bill clapping is on the part of a male challenging other storks who may come too close to his chosen nesting site; other times, the loud and distinctive bill clapping can be heard throughout rookeries when the male uses his bill to strike the bill of the female.

Sep 26

38 Comments

Snow in the Wetlands

All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen. —Ralph Waldo Emerson

A sweet, lone Snowy egret (Egretta thula) stands vigil in our wetlands as dusk approaches.

Snowy egrets are the American counterparts to the very similar Old World Little egrets, which are now beginning to appear in parts of the Caribbean. Along will curved plumes down their backs, their yellow lore (the area between the bill and the eyes) turns red during the breeding season. I spied this guy in the Spring — and his lore and plumage attest to the breeding time. Snowy egrets were once hunted mercilessly for these beautiful plumes, which were in high demand as decorations for women’s hats (as were the plumage of Great egrets and other birds). Their populations were drastically reduced to dangerously low levels, but they’re now protected by law in the US under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

They stalk their prey — including fish, crustaceans, insects and small reptiles — in shallow water, often shuffling their feet to flush it out into view. Snowy egrets will also stand stock still and wait, just like this guy, to ambush their next meal.

A Snowy egret in breeding plumage patiently waits for a meal in the wetlands

Posts tagged ‘birds’

Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections