Full White Bird Mix

I put in on the Menunketusuck River at the usual spot, a half mile below Chapman Pond and a couple miles above the sea. The tide is just starting to come in. There is a thick overcast and it begins to mist as soon as I settle in the canoe. It will mist and sprinkle almost the entire time that I am out. It is much more comfortable than living in the heat and humidity that would come with any sun.

An Osprey is perched at the first bend, and I flush a Green Heron at the second, which flies up and disappears into the tree tops. It is calm and still, and I do not expect to see anyone else.

The marsh is narrow in this upper section, 50-70 yards of spartina on either side of the river until it comes up against a hardwood forest. Near Opera Singer Point the marsh spreads out. A lot of birds prefer this area, probably both because of the distance to the trees and the better feeding due to the many small channels and pannes.

As I turn one of the bends, I find thirty some white birds on either side of the river. A few are Great Egrets - noticeably larger with a bright yellow bill, several are Snowy Egrets, identified by the yellow feet and black bill, and the others, perhaps half of them, are young Little Blue Herons - the size of Snowy Egrets, but with greenish legs and feet and without a pure black bill. One of the theories as to why young Little Blues are white is that they can mix with Egrets, a safety in numbers thing. There is one morphing Little Blue as well - its feathers patchy white and blue as it becomes an adult. 

Left to right - Little Blue Heron, Little Blue Heron, Snowy Egret, Great Egret

If someone told me that they wanted to see a Glossy Ibis or a Little Blue Heron, this is where I would send them. I don't know if it is real, but it seems to me that the population of Little Blues and Glossy Ibises has been increasing in this marsh. 

Little Blue Heron morphing to adult

In the tree above the abandoned opera singer's house is a mature Bald Eagle. I'll bet that 4 out of every 5 times I paddle here, there is an Eagle on that perch. The white birds are just far enough away that they would see and have time to evade the Eagle.

The tide is right for returning through the railroad underpass, so I head down to the Post Road bridge. There are four young and one mature Little Blues up in a some trees, and a couple of Great Egrets along the river. I spot a fox loping along the river near the Post Road, but it is raining too hard to pull out the camera.

On the way back, three Glossy Ibises fly past, one seems to be being chased by a mature Little Blue Heron. 

With a few more inches of tide, I can now scan across the broad spartina flats. I find four more Glossy Ibises on river left feeding in a panne with a few Egrets.