Egret flying over Lake Nelson

Egret

Meadowlands birds

Egret

Downy Woodpecker

Juvenile Mute Swan

Ruddy Duck Family

We went to the NJMC Environmental Center in Lyndhurst, NJ on Sunday AM. We are a little early for many of the migrating birds, but we did take a few photos. The highlight was the baby ruddy ducks. It's not a great photo, but they are very small and stayed by the small island away from people. They were so cute diving underwater.

The juvenile mute swan is showing off its foot. We have a bit of a debate whether this is a deformity because the foot seems too high on the back and it didn't ever seem to put it in the water.

Great Egret

 

Dining in Clearwater and St. Petersburg

The seafood is supposed to be good in the greater Tampa area. This great egret on Honeymoon Island must have been thrilled when he caught this fish.


However, he had never heard that you should never eat anything larger than your head. He tried many different ways for about 5 minutes, but was unable to swallow the fish.


The next day, we saw another egret at Sand Key Park struggle a while with a fish, but eventually positioned it and swallowed it.


This osprey shows a different way to deal with a large fish.



We were surprised to see that the great egret also eats grasshoppers.

Great Egret

 

 

Photos of Great Egrets from Bolsa Chica

Egret at the Meadowlands

 

Egret in Flight

Different Day, Same Egret

Great Egret

We went out in the boat at dusk and saw quite a few birds. On the way back, Chris spotted an egret hidden by the shore. We watched for a few minutes and saw him catch a few small fish.

Great Egret Fishing

We went out at dusk and watched an egret fishing for about 20 minutes and took about 100 photos. Here's one of the best. He didn't catch a fish while we were there. There were several kingfishers around, but they refused to be photographed again. We'll try again tomorrow.

Egret at Island Beach State Park

Here is a photo of an egret taken on the bay side of Island Beach State Park on the Jersey shore.

Egret

Egret on Dock

Great Egret by the shore

Great Egret

We saw the Great Egret catching quite a few fish in the stream just past the Lake Nelson Dam.

Great Egret in a tree

Here's a photo of a white heron, also know as the Great Egret.

Special Caribbean Issue

While Lake Nelson has it charms, sometimes people and birds require warmer climates and turquoise waters. We spent a week in St. Vincent and the Grenadines on two islands (Petit St. Vincent and Palm Island). Here are some the birds we encountered.

Bananaquit

Tropical Mockingbird

Frigate

Blue Heron having a snack.

Great Egret



Great Egret having a meal

Common Moorhen

Blackbird: with stolen Sweet-n-low.

Hummingbird



Sandpiper

Another Bananaquit

This duck was in a lagoon in the middle of Palm Island, SVG. It took some time searching on the internet, but we eventually identified it as a blue-winged teal on vacation in Palm Island, SVG. We prefered the caribbean waters, but they liked the lagoon.