Friday, January 27, 2012

Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias)

On January 22, 2012 I caught a glimpse of this Great Blue Heron in the arroyo from the service road just west of Erringer Road. (S)he was very skittish upon each of my approaches which made getting a decent photograph difficult. The Great Blue Heron is our most widely distributed and largest heron. It can be found in both wetland and upland habitats where it feeds on crustaceans, vertebrates, and small mammals. The Great Blue Heron is often a solitary bird except when it gathers in breeding colonies called "heronries" to build stick nests high in trees. The species has a pure white morph (the  Great White Heron) which can be mistaken for a Great Egret and is sometimes considered a distinct species.



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