...part 2 of the hungry little Green Heron

Part 2: I had so many cool photos of this juvenile Green Heron, I had to break the post into two installments (click here for part one). The video at the end shows him catching another fish and licking his chops again...

Head-on shot of a juvenile Green Heron. 

The Green Heron hears my camera shutter and gives me the stink eye!

Juvenile Green Heron Fishing from Kelly Riccetti on Vimeo.


Photos taken at the Ibis Pond rookery on Pinckney Island NWR in Hilton Head, SC June of 2012.

p.s. We just returned from Hawaii (Maui). I hope to have a few photos of those cool birds up soon. 

Juvenile Green Heron licking his chops...

This juvenile Green Heron was fun to watch. He would move slowly back and forth along a downed branch that hung over the mote at the Ibis Pond rookery on Pinckney Island in Hilton Head, SC looking for small fish. As he watched for his next morsel, he would lick his chops over and over. Those little fish must have tasted good! The video at the end of the post captures the action...

A juvenile Green Heron sees a fish swimming in the green waters below...

Baby plumes blowing in the breeze. Not many left...

Green Herons are stocky little herons. They always seem to have their necks pulled in.

...part of the fun of watching this juvenile Green Heron was watching his long toes curl around the branch as he walked slowly back and forth. Every move he made seemed to be deliberate, stealthy, and slow. 

...watch out, little fish.

Juvenile Green Heron Licking his Chops and Catching a Fish from Kelly Riccetti on Vimeo.


 I photographed this hungry little fellow last summer on June 12, 2012.

Wood Storks and their unique way of feeding...

I could not believe my luck when I saw this small group of Wood Storks (Mycteria americana). They were feeding in the shallows along the driveway to the Pinckney Island NWR. It was my last day of vacation and I was leaving the park. I was glum and morose, and just like a kid dragging her feet, I was driving slowly with the windows open, watching the water and the grasses, trying to wring out every last bit of the island that I could. Leaving Pinckney is never fun, but suddenly, zing! yes!! happiness!!! -- Wood Storks were feeding about 50 feet away in the shallows...

A juvenile Wood Stork feeding in the shallows at Pinckney Island NWR in South Carolina.

I pulled the car over and watched the small flock through the binocs. The birds were feeding, and I could see them stirring the water with their feet. They had their bills open in the water, waiting for a fish or crab to make contact. After a while, I got out of the car, crossed over and sat down behind the grasses. I remained still and quiet, and they went about their business of fishing and eating...

...a juvenile Wood Stork fishes with his bill open, waiting for a fish or crab to make contact.

Woods Storks have a unique way of catching their prey. They like to forage in shallow water with large concentrations of fish or crabs where they hold their bills open in the water. When a fish or crab makes contact with the bill, it triggers a snap-shut reflex, and the Wood Stork nabs its dinner without ever having to see into the murky water. Because Wood Storks are tactile feeders and do not have to see their prey to catch it, their method of feeding is called "grope-feeding" or "tacto-location." Click here for a detailed explanation of this feeding method and other information on Wood Storks.

In the following video, you can see the Wood Stork stirring the water with its foot, then scooping up a little crab. At the end of the video, I put some of the action in slow motion to better see the Wood Stork eating a little crab...

Wood Stork Feeding in the Shallows by "Foot Stirring" from Kelly Riccetti on Vimeo.

A Wood Stork uses "foot stirring" to drum up some lunch. 

The Wood Stork is endangered in the United States, so I was especially happy to have been in the right place at the right time to see this small flock of Wood Storks...even if it was my last day of vacation.

Wood Storks are doing well in Georgia and South Carolina, and the government is thinking about changing their status from endangered to threatened. Click here for an NPR article and broadcast of the story.

Wood Storks are large birds. This guy was over three feet tall. I loved watching him move slowly through the water.

An adult and a juvenile Wood Stork walk single file. The adult is on the left. Check out that bald, scaly, woody looking head. On the right is the juvenile Wood Stork, still fresh and new and covered in feathers. 

In part two of this series I'll focus on the adult Wood Stork's face, so you can see how different a juvenile and an adult look. I took these photos on June 19, 2012.

The silver feathers on an Anhinga's wings...or...baby's got bling!

When you seen Anhingas at a distance, they appear black, and you might not even know they carry a spectacular pattern of black and white (silver) feathers on their wings. When you're sitting right next to them, however, it's easy to see the "bling" on their backs...

A male Anhinga preening, showing off the striking pattern of black and silvery-white feathers on his wings.

This is the same Anhinga I talked about in two earlier posts that sat very close to me (click here for those close-up photos). Close viewing of the Anhinga's back let me study the beautiful pattern in his wing feathers (coverts and scapulars). I always thought these feathers were white, but up close, I could see they were silver...not white, not dull gray, but shiny silver!

The "white" covert and scapular feathers on an Anhinga are a glossy silver color. From a distance they appear white because of the contrast with the black feathers.

When I got home, I looked up Anhingas to see if they really did have glossy silver wing coverts and scapulars, or had I just imagined it. It turns out they do, and they owe their silver feathers to a special structure in the barbules of the feather. I found a detailed technical article published in the Journal of Morphology that explains why those feathers are indeed silver. Click here to read "Proximate Bases of Silver Color in Anhinga (Anhinga anhinga) Feathers," by Matthew D. Shawkey, Rafael Maia, and Liliana D'Alba.

...whether silver or white, the pattern on the back of an Anhinga is striking.

Bird feathers contain a center shaft called a rachis. Barbs branch off the rachis, and barbules branch off the barbs. The barbules run almost parallel with the rachis and hook together to make the feather strong.  The barbules in silver feathers are different--they are longer than those in other feathers, and they are flattened. Additionally, they twist a little, and one side is black and the other side is translucent. The twist means part of the translucent barbule is exposed, which creates the silver sheen. I found an article on the BBC Earth News site explaining the research of Dr. Ismael Galvan by Matt Walker called "Birds unveil 'silver wings'" (click here). This article is a little easier to understand than the technical research paper and clearly explains how the silver sheen appears on the feathers.

Galvan concluded that dark-colored birds evolved the silver sheen as a way to "become more colorful and conspicuous," while still keeping the benefits of dark-colored feathers (dark feathers contain the pigment melanin, which makes them stronger and protects the feathers from abrasion and UV radiation). 

This is the third part of the Anhinga series:
Part 1: Anhinga close-ups
Part 2: More Anhinga photos; spread-wing posture
Part 3: The silver feathers on an Anhinga's wings

More Anhinga photos; spread-wing posture and feather closeups...

...continued from the previous post, Anhinga closeups: those crazy Anhingas.
If you read the previous post, you know this bird came very close to where I was sitting and started drying out his feathers. Originally he was sunning himself on a branch in the water, then hopped on shore near me. After a while he returned to the branch. If I didn't know better, I'd think he wanted to make sure I could photograph all of him instead of just the closeups of his face. His look back at me seems to say, "Are you getting this?"

A beautiful Anhinga looks over his shoulder at me while I photograph him.
"Yes, Mr. Anhinga. I'm getting it..."

An Anhinga sits in the spread-wing posture as he continues to dry his feathers. 

Anhingas sit in the sun with their wings spread even when they are dry because they also use this posture for thermoregulation. 

Anhingas and cormorants both use this posture to dry their feathers, but Anhingas rely on the posture to help keep them warm too. Anhingas have low metabolic rates and high rates of heat loss from their bodies. This is why you don't find many Anhingas up north. They need the sun's warming rays to survive. According to Stanford University (click here for the article), dry Anhingas use the spread-wing posture when the ambient temperature is cool but the sun is shining brightly. They sit with their backs to the sun for optimum heat absorption. Why don't cormorants do this? Because they don't have to. Their feather structure is different. Although both have "wettable" feathers allowing them to lose buoyancy so they can dive and swim under the water to hunt for fish, only the outer part of a Cormorant's feathers becomes waterlogged. This creates an insulating layer of air next to the skin when the bird is under water.

Anhinga's feathers become wet all the way to the skin. Anihingas use the muscles in their skin to make the feathers stand on end to help them dry.

The sun shines through the wing feathers on an Anhinga (interior view) creating an amber glow.

...small feathers "standing on edge" make the upper part of this Anginga's wings look spiky.

"Water Turkey" is one of an Anhinga's nicknames. It's easy to see its origin...the striped pattern and light tips on a spread Anhinga's tail resemble a turkey's. It's other nickname, "Snakebird," is easy to figure out too. When an Anhinga's body is submerged and only its shiny, wet head and neck are visible above the water, it looks like a black snake swimming along (click here for a photo in a previous post).

...I have another post on this fellow in the works. It focuses on the beautiful pattern of white feathers on the back of an Anhinga's wings. I photographed this bird on June 14, 2012 while we were on our vacation in Hilton Head, SC. I was sitting on the bank of Lake Thomas in the Sea Pines Forest Preserve on Hilton Head Island.

This is the second of three Anhinga posts:
Part 1: Anhinga close-ups
Part 2: More Anhinga photos; spread-wing posture
Part 3: The silver feathers on an Anhinga's wings

Anhinga closeups...

Anhingas are amazing birds—and very exotic to northern girls who don't get to see them up close very often. It's understandable then that I was stunned when this bird plopped down beside me as I sat near Lake Thomas in the Sea Pines Forest Preserve on Hilton Head Island. He had been drying his feathers on a branch sticking out of the water when I first saw him, but I wasn't paying much attention to him then. I had a map in front of me, and I was trying to figure out where a roost of Yellow-crowned Night Herons were. Suddenly, he made a gangly jump-flight and landed about 15-20 feet away from me, like he just wanted to drop in and say "Hello..."

Hello Mr. Anhinga. Charmed, I'm sure...

I really wanted to find the Yellow-crowned Night Heron roost, but adrenalin from the excitement of an unexpected encounter helped me focus my mind on the anhinga and soon washed away all thoughts of the night herons. I was more than happy to drop the map on the grass and just sit beside this incredibly cool bird. With his long, snaky neck and sharp dagger-like bill, it was hard to take my eyes off him...

The sky blue skin on an Anhinga's face is striking. I'm not normally close enough, however, to see it so clearly! This bird landed about 15-20 feet away from me as I was sitting beside the lake.

Anhingas lack oil glands, so they can't waterproof their feathers like ducks and other water birds. His scraggly, wet-dog-fur looking feathers definitely need some attention. A soft fluffy towel to dry off with would have been nice, but the sun and heat did the job just fine. 

He immediately struck up his famous feather-drying pose, and looked around. A few small bugs here buzzing near his face, and he'd shake his head now and then and snap at the tiny insects.

A male Anhinga hanging his feathers out to dry...

Why do Anhingas hold their wings open to dry their feathers?
You might already know about why these birds do not waterproof their feathers. If you don't, click here for a post I wrote last year on Anhingas that explains why waterlogged feathers help Anhingas by reducing their buoyancy so they can swim and fish under water.

...and if you haven't seen it yet, head over to 10,000 Birds to read Nate Swick's I and the Bird post on Cormorants, Anhingas and Darters.

An Anhinga snapping at flying insects from Kelly Riccetti on Vimeo.

I photographed this fellow on June 14, 2012 while we were on our vacation in Hilton Head, SC. It's about time I started posting some of the beautiful South Carolina birds we saw back then! Another post on this guy is in the works...

p.s. I never did find the Yellow-crowned Night Heron roost!

This is the first of three Anhinga posts:
Part 1: Anhinga close-ups
Part 2: More Anhinga photos; spread-wing posture
Part 3: The silver feathers on an Anhinga's wings

Immature Little Blue Herons, photos, sketches, and a watercolor

Once a month, I'm a contributor on the Birding is Fun blog. I often forget to publish those posts on Red and the Peanut, so I'm going to try to add them in every now and then. Here's a post from way back in July:

Little Little Blues are white...
Early this June, Matty, Rick and I went to Hilton Head, SC for our vacation. I visited the nearby Pinckney Island NWP every day to watch the birds nesting at the Ibis Pond rookery. The Little Blue Herons were especially active this year, and the deep slate-colored adults could be seen sitting on nests, preening while they perched at the end of branches, flying overhead with long twigs destined for other nests, or just fluffing up to transform themselves into ridiculously attractive birds, but it was their snowy white offspring that I really paid attention to. The white-feathered young Little Blue Herons were busy flapping their wings, hopping from branch to branch, and waiting and begging for food...

Two young Little Blue Herons stretch and flap their wings from branches near their nest. They were not yet airborne, still gaining strength for their first flights. Here they were watching an adult that had just landed a few branches over, no doubt hoping for food!

Little Blue Herons have white plumage while they are young and retain the white color for their first year. They often nest with Snowy Egrets, but it's not too hard to tell the two white birds apart. Look at their legs, Little Blue Heron babies have greenish legs and feet. They also have dark blue-gray tipped wing feathers. It's often hard to see the dark-tipped feathers when the birds are at rest, but when they stretch, it's easy to spot the dark tips on the wing feathers.

...with the wings folded it's a little harder to see the dark-tipped wing feathers on a young Little Blue Heron, but if you look closely at the farthest end of the wing, you can see the dark tips among all the white.

The nice thing about a rookery, is the birds stay put for you! All this posing and sticking near the nest makes it easy to sketch and draw them. At Ibis Pond on Pinckney Island I love to sit down, set up the scope, and get out the sketchbook. Here are a few quick sketches of the two babies...

...pencil sketches of immature Little Blue Herons

Immature Little Blue Heron (watercolor heightened with black and white conte crayon).
...painted this from a sketchbook drawing earlier this summer.

...and here's papa fluffing up in all his blue grandeur!
(I took this photo last year at Pinckney, but it's one of my favorite fluffing-up shots.)

II have lots and lots of Hilton Head birds sitting in the archives patiently waiting to get out. I need to hunker down, focus and bring those photos to life! (...I still have lots of cool birds, insects, turtles and snakes to write about from Magee Marsh in Toledo, Shawnee State Park in Ohio, and Greenbo Lake in Kentucky too...I'll never get caught up!)

A Blue Dasher dragonfly obelisking in the sun...

When it's hot out, you'll often see dragonflies perched on a stem in the sun with their long bodies (abdomens) sticking straight up towards the sky. It looks like they are doing some sort of insect handstand, but they are really working on thermoregulation, and their strange posture is called obelisking. Not all dragonflies obelisk to cool their bodies, some drop their abdomens downward, some shade themselves with their wings, some circulate hemolymph through their abdominal sections, and some dive into the water...

A male Blue Dasher (Pachydiplax longipennis) dragonfly obelisking in the hot sun to regulate his body temperature.

By raising their abdomens straight up, dragonflies reduce the surface area heated by the sun, which helps them cool their bodies. Blue Dashers are famous for obelisking. They often take the stance even when the temperatures are not that high, and males also seem to use the posture as a threat display when defending their territory. Additionally, if the sun is low in the sky and it's cooler, they use the obelisk posture to heat themselves by exposing more of their abdomen to the sun's warming rays.

A male Blue Dasher dragonfly has several distinguishing field marks--a powder-blue abdomen tipped in black, amazing turquoise-green eyes in a white face, brownish areas on the wings, and very noticeable stripes on its thorax.

Blue Dashers are common in numbers but not in looks! With powdery blue abdomens and bright turquoise-green eyes, it's hard to pass them by without a second look!

Blue Dashers are "perching" predators. They like to perch in one place and fly out to catch their prey, returning to the same perch to eat it. Because they spend so much time sitting and waiting in one place without moving, thermoregulation by adjusting their posture works well for them (source: Obelisk posture, Wikipedia). Blue Dashers are formidable predators and will eat all sorts of insects including mosquitoes, flies, butterflies, moths, mayflies, flying ants and termites (source: Idaho State Univeristy).

Even as a naiad (the nymph form that lives in the water), Blue Dashers are "sit and wait" predators, hiding behind rocks and logs until the prey goes past.

...an interesting fact: Blue Dasher naiads can tolerate low levels of oxygen in the water, so just as lichens are an indicator species of a healthy environment, a lot of Blue Dasher naiads in relation to other species in an area can indicate low water quality (source: Idaho State University).

(I photographed this guy on 6/13/2010 on Pinckney Island in Hilton Head, SC. It was really hot that day and beautiful. The field guide I use to help me identify dragonflies is "Dragonflies and Damselflies of Northeast Ohio," by Larry Rosche, Judy Semroc, and Linda Gilbert)

"Where did you get the photos of Billy Idol?"

...is what Rick said when he came into my office and saw this puffed-up Cattle Egret on my screen...

"Pinckney," I responded casually. "He was great. Very polite...put on a fab show."

I've heard of dogs looking like their owners, but never birds looking like celebs...

...he was dancing with himself here.

The famous mohawk...

...off to the next gig.

...photographed at Ibis Pond on Pinckney Island, near Hilton Head, South Carolina 6/8/11. For other Cattle Egret posts, click here.