Cool Critters: A sick, cute and very old blue heron

The great blue bird, standing as tall as a 7-year-old and boasting a 6-foot wingspan, is among the largest and most unique birds you’ll see in the Inland Northwest or anywhere. where in the United States.

We are happy that this huge bird is often seen near lakes, rivers, streams and ponds in our area. Whether it’s standing in shallow water or flapping its huge wings as it flies on two curled trailing legs, it’s hard not to be sad. Besides being huge, they are equal parts beautiful and prehistoric.

The big blue bird is also, well, blue. No, not cobalt or sky blue, but light blue. Although it is a subtle shade, “blue is not common in nature,” said wildlife biologist Mark Vekasy of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Another distinctive color pattern is its white face with a broad black stripe running from above each eye to the back of the head, he added.

Not to mention the bird’s twisted, rusty legs or its orange-yellow knife-shaped beak.

Great blue herons look so unique that “people have been drawing and painting and photographing them for years and years,” Vekasy said. “They definitely get attention.”

If the onlookers are quiet enough, these birds make good examples. They can resemble statues suspended in shallow water, standing still for long periods of time as they use their keen eyes to scan their next meal of large fish, but also frogs, crabs and snakes. .

In a 2021 study published in the journal BioScience, “Who’s Observing the Observers?”, the great blue heron was the fourth most observed species uploaded to the nature app, iNaturalist over an 11-year period. from 1.7 million nature-enthusiast users, the 10 most reported animals “were species that were easily identified due to their size, behavior and appearance,” the authors wrote. (The monarch butterfly placed first, and the Western bumblebee placed a close second.)

Go back to that statue bug scanning the water for food. When a small fish gets close, the bird sneaks up on it by lifting one leg at a time (those legs take up about half of the bird’s 4-foot length), making no noise as it moves through the water, said. wildlife biologist Rod Sayler of Washington State University.

“It’s amazing to see them moving slowly in shallow water as they hunt for fish and other animals,” said Sayler, who has encountered “many” great blues over the course of decades. five of his bird fieldwork. As a result, he saw the bird’s impatience and slow and methodical movement towards the next meal.

Once within striking distance, the great blue heron stretches its long, S-shaped neck forward and plunges its powerful mouth into the fish – often within seconds. It then throws its head back and swallows the predator down its long, thin neck.

Great blue herons are mostly solitary birds, except during the breeding and nesting season which begins in early spring. That’s when they gather in colonies known as rookeries, where they build large nests in groups on trees near water. In these waterfowl habitats, mature birds take turns guarding predators such as owls and hawks in order to hunt for eggs or chicks. They sometimes set up rookeries inside man-made structures such as I-beams near bridges, said Vekasy of the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Now that it is the end of August, adults and their children have left their homes to live alone. Adults typically return to the same site in the spring, renovating previous years’ nests.

For now, some herons will migrate south to California, Arizona and Nevada for the winter, Vekasy explained, while others will remain in the Inland Northwest.

Because frozen water prevents them from accessing their primary food sources, “habitat-wise, there’s not enough to sustain herons year-round,” he said. Hibernating insects tend to hunt fish in frozen water bodies. When fish are scarce, they move to dry land to eat mice and rats.

Vekasy said: “Most people don’t realize how many small mammals they eat.

So, if you happen to see a motionless, legged bird one day in a snowy field, you’ll know it’s probably a big blue bug that lives year-round in the Inland Northwest. Watching. Waiting.

Or maybe you’ll see one flying with huge flapping wings, its long neck bent into an S shape and two stick-like legs extending beyond the fanned tail feathers. In flight, this bird resembles a large prehistoric winged creature.

It is true that the great blue Heron did not live close to Tyrannosaurus rex 66 million years ago, but the oldest fossils of this bird are 14 million years old, which means that it is a species of old.

The ancient spirit of this bird can be heard in its raspy cry in flight, said Sayler of WSU.

He said: “To me, the ‘sound’ of a big blue bug makes me think of what an ancient pterodactyl might have sounded like.