Galvanized by Ned's posting the other day, I toddled over to Farmville to
look for the Great White Heron today. It was there from noon through 12.45
pm.
The bird was patrolling the edge of the dam, so was best seen from the very
first parking possibility after entering the park. From the pier it could
sometimes be seen, but was sometimes obscured by the concrete extraction
features.
The bird does not seem to spook easily, foraging today only about 50 feet
from an active fisherman. I had relatively close views. There are no signs of
any plumes (not surprising at this time of year), nor of any off-white
feathers. Although I am not good at bird sizes, when there is nothing to
compare with, this bird looked much larger than our average Great Blue Heron.
Sibley says '10% larger', but I would have thought somewhat more than that.
I met two fishermen, who said that they first noticed the bird on the July 4
holiday. One said that last week there had been two birds; but since he
seemed incapable of accepting that this bird and Great Egret were two
different things, I presume that one of his two birds was a Great Egret. The
other fishermen understood about the difference and looked at the bird
through my scope. He said that a couple of Great Blues had been present
earlier and that there had been an altercation with the Great White, after
which the Great Blues flew off.
Stephen Eccles
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