Tricolored Heron

 

June 13th (posted June 14th)

          Some of you may have noticed that there has not been a new post for at least two weeks.  Mike and I have been visiting family on Long Island and in New Jersey.  We also spent a couple of days in Manhattan seeing the sights and going to a show.  It was a nice visit but on our drive home both of us were ready for a little birding. 

          As soon as we crossed into Ohio, we got off of I-80 and headed south to Poland Township Park which is a little southeast of Youngstown.  There have been fairly recent reports of Clay-colored Sparrows and Blue Grosbeaks here.  We didn’t have any specific information about where to look for the birds, so we wandered around for an hour on a hot afternoon and didn’t see any sign of either bird.  We still had miles to go, so we couldn’t linger too long.

          We got back on the highway and our next destination was Howards Marsh which is on our home turf.  Once again, there was a report of a White-faced Ibis that had been seen by many birders two days ago.  We did have more specific info this time, but we had no luck finding the ibis. 

          Finally, our last stop was Maumee Bay State Park where two special birds had been seen earlier in the day, so we had high hopes about our chances.  The first bird was a Laughing Gull which had been seen at 4:30pm on the inland beach.  We arrived about 7:00pm.  We searched the inland beach and walked along the lake to no avail.  This Laughing Gull would have been very noticeable because is has a black head and would stand out.  Once again, we dipped.  We were tired, hungry, and getting a little frustrated.  Mike said, “Did we do something to offend the birding gods?”

          Our last hope was at the end of the Maumee Bay boardwalk.  We walked all the way out to the observation tower where a Tricolored Heron had been seen.  We got to the spot and, low and behold, there he was!   Out in the open, easy to see, and very cooperative.  Directly behind the heron was a rainbow, and we hadn’t even had any rain.  Very strange.

 A Tricolored Heron is very rare in Ohio.  It was formerly known as the Louisiana Heron and normally is found year-round along the gulf and Atlantic coasts.  We were very happy to finally have success.  We celebrated with chicken wings and beer at Buffalo Wild Wings.  

(1 new species, total 273) 

Tricolored Heron (very rare) 

                                            Tricolored Heron

                                            Another view


Comments

  1. AnnJune 15, 2022 at 5:53 AM

    Wow. Unbelievable, I never would have expected a tri-colored heron in NW Ohio. Welcome back.

    ReplyDelete

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