[birdky] great white heron in putnam co., tn--age and i.d.
- From: Steve Stedman <SSTEDMAN@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, birdky@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 30 Oct 2002 08:26:53 -0600 (CST)
I have to eat some crow about the Great White
Heron. It was not an immature as I originally believed,
but an adult. The main reason I say this is because
it finally dawned on me that the head plume(s) I saw with
Roseanna Denton on Oct. 9 could have been present only
on an adult at this time of year. I got some photos
of the bird yesterday that clearly show the plume(s),
which is shorter than the head plume(s) on Great Blue
Heron. This field mark means that the bird has to be
a Great White Heron and not an albinistic Great Blue
Heron because the head plume(s) on an albinistic bird
ought to be as long as the head plume(s) on an normal
Great Blue rather than shorter as is the case with
this bird. So the bottom line is that the bird is
an adult Great White. There is one previous record
of Great White in the Upper Cumberland Region--an
apparent immature in Pulaski Co., Kentucky, 2 years
ago--and there was a series of records of an adult
in Upper East Tennessee from 1990 to 2002 that probably
all pertain to the same Great White Heron that became
the first Tennessee record; apparently not all members
of the Tennessee Bird Records Committee were convinced
by the description of that bird, but the length of the
head plume(s) may not have been considered in the
analysis of the evidence; this feature would appear
to eliminate the possibility of an albinistic Great
Blue Heron.
Steve Stedman
Cookeville, TN
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