Great Blue Heron
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
This magnificent creature has chosen our area to call home, apparently.
It first scared the bejeezus out of me one full-moon morning this spring while out walking the dogs. I heard a tremendous ratcheting sound from the dark woods, and then this…thing…flew up, silhouetted for a brief, terrifying moment in front of the moon. My first thought was: pterodactyl. That’s exactly what it looked like (not that I have any firsthand experience with extinct beasties…but you get my drift). I felt like I’d stepped into Jurassic Park and didn’t know it. Creepy, with a light fog drifting between the bare-bone trees and then this animal rising up from the primordial mist to escape my dogs’ curiosity.
A few weeks later, I saw it again. This time at the dog park. It had landed at the pond’s edge and stood there in all its stately splendor…until one of the dogs spotted it and created a dog-stampede in its direction.
This thing is quite large, with a wing-span of easily four or five feet across.
There aren’t any wildlife refuges in the area that I’m aware of, and haven’t seen a bird like this since living in Michigan. Perhaps because it was such a startling sight to see it on the high plains of Colorado that made me gasp with awe. Even moreso than when I saw my first Bald Eagle a couple months ago.
A beautiful bird. I see those sometimes around here. We have two wildlife refuges near my office that attract all sorts of birds. But the heron is one of my favorites.
That would have scared me to death.
We have these, they’re gorgeous…great pic. We also have Sandhill Cranes, which are twice, maybe three times as big and sound like a pterodactyl!