Most rookery photographs are from Egret and Heron locations. Wood Storks are typically nesting in remote places.
While this was taken in a Great Egret spot plenty of Wood Storks had moved in.
Rookeries always mean in flight opportunities, and low flight. Great for Wood Stork images.
A Tricolored Heron, but not showing off his best.
No privacy out there, even at bath time.
To me a photographs surrounding environment is just as important as the subject. You can’t always get beautiful backgrounds, but when you see one like this you grab the shot.
Unfortunately the Great Blue had a different idea and just as I shot, he jumped. However ultimately it made for a nice series.
A nice lift off, and then another Great Blue moves in right behind. This must be the best seat in town because the stump wasn’t empty for even a minute.
I stayed focused on the first bird in flight not taking any chances on missing everything being greedy, been there, done that.
I would have liked to catch both in the center frame though …
A common sight but I couldn’t resist the light on him.
This small heron is getting his breeding colors.
Best viewed large.
I was shooting shore birds when I spotted this Great Blue. I didn’t expect one but this is an inlet along the coast so he was in clear view for a long way.
Ten frames a second and a wide open view makes for a bunch of images in a series.
I narrowed down the number of photographs and skipped many over water to finish with the Heron touching down on a small spit of land.
And yes, pun intended.
Caught these Snowy Egret lined up at one of several tidal pools.
They would jump, fly at the surface, and try to grab whatever was available.
Not something I see often in swamps, in open water it must work well.
Great Blue Heron in a jungle.
A bunch of big Palm trees really. Outside the view finder is a big marsh, not much of a jungle.
We found several Reddish Egrets while visiting Merritt Island, Florida. The salt marshes there are one of a few places along the Northeast coast they prefer.
There are a few white morph Reddish around but most have this beautiful ‘reddish’ coloring.
These birds have a complete dance routine they use to scare up small prey and create wing shade on the bright surface. Unfortunately all the ones we saw were calmly fishing like any other Egret.
If you have ever seen a Tricolored Heron dance around while fishing you have seen a slow imitation of a Reddish. Tricolored dance a waltz, Reddish a Balanchine ballet.
It’s not uncommon to see one of these birds with a tracking device. They are always in danger of toxic changes to the coastal waters and a bellwether for identifying problems.
