Okefenokee Swamp: The Heron is at Home

Green Heron Okefenokee Swamp
© Photographer: William Wise | iNat Observation: 29932812 - Green Heron along the Trembling Earth Nature Trail; Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge, Georgia. March 10, 2015.

In 1895, naturalist Bradford Torrey wrote of the Green Heron being at home in "watery woods", such as are found in the Okefenokee Swamp:

"The day was before me, and the place was lively with birds. Pine-wood sparrows, pine warblers, and red-winged blackbirds were in song; two red-shouldered hawks were screaming, a flicker was shouting, a red-bellied woodpecker cried kur-r-r-r, brown-headed nuthatches were gossiping in the distance, and suddenly I heard, what I never thought to hear in a pinery, the croak of a green heron. I turned quickly and saw him. It was indeed he. What a friend is ignorance, mother of all those happy surprises which brighten existence as they pass, like the butterflies of the wood. The heron was at home, and I was the stranger. For there was water near, as there is everywhere in Florida; and subsequently, in this very place, I met not only the green heron, but three of his relatives,—the great blue, the little blue, and the dainty Louisiana, more poetically known (and worthy to wear the name) as the 'Lady of the Waters.'"

  • Torrey, Bradford (1895). A Florida Sketch-Book.
Posted on 30 de novembro de 2022, 12:57 AM by williamwisephoto williamwisephoto

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