A few photographs more of a general interest type than anything.
In a back swamp it was deserted, but of to the far side I found the Anhinga quietly drying himself.
I took the shot wide. Scenes in a swamp are hard to shoot, too much going on. This I thought was open enough to be OK.
Just days old and you can hear them all over the swamps.
And they are chewing on each other!
Click to enlarge, the tiny fuzz balls are two newly hatched Great Blue Herons.
Note; over exposed image to allow for contrasting of the tiny birds.
No nesting, in the honeymoon phase…
I wasn’t ready for this, they lulled me to sleep.
Nothing was happening, a Great Blue sat on a nest and a Great Egret was planning a spot a little higher up the tree. This is prime real estate and there will be multiple nests, multiple species.
I never saw the second Heron come back.
He was not at all happy to find a Great Egret nearby. The noise was what got my attention. The Great Egret is big enough to fight back, but Herons are bigger.
The Egret dropped back and left for another spot.
This repeated itself right here several times.
The flow is;
The Egret will leave enough space between them, the Heron gets tired of the same old fight.
However, after the Heron chicks are half grown the adults leave to provide food. The Egrets will then attack the chicks. Some young fight off the Egrets, some do not.
Egrets are bullies in rookeries. Pay back is Anhinga attack Egret nests.
None of this is pretty. But it goes on year after year.
As an FYI, any photographs I capture that are too graphic are not published.
He found a perfect place to nap. Almost directly under a small wooden bridge.
This was shot through the space of two side boards.
Nobody looks down. He could sit right there and not be chased or bothered. Clever.
While they can change their colors this is about as drastic as it gets.
Most of the time they are a brighter green.
This one was resting on a railing along an old wooden bridge. A reason to look down before hanging on.
The Great Egrets are now working in the rookeries also.
Once there are multiple species sharing space it gets complicated. They are competitors for food, space, and materials.
This capture is just one of the hundred trips these birds make. Some their own fault since they bring such small pieces of material.
They also tend to do most of the gathering at the very end of the day.
Maybe it takes a long time to catch food, or maybe the put it off until the last minute.
