Bird of the Week: Great Blue Heron
Glorious.
I went home to San Francisco last week. My folks live next to Golden Gate Park, and the city recently finished restoring one of the park’s lakes near their house. It’s very lovely.
Anyway, I was walking around this lake with my mother, commenting on the loveliness and so forth, when we ran right smack into this:
A great blue heron, just hanging out. Apparently, this heron has chosen the lake as its domain, so you can see it pretty often. Spectacular.
Great blue herons are one of the more common birds out there. They can thrive in all sorts of climates and ecosystems, which explains why you can find them pretty much anywhere in North America at some point in the year. I expect a lot of them are probably like this one: just doing their thing, hanging out near water, waiting for a fish to catch. All pretty mundane in its way.
But think about the wonder of the world we live in, where steps from your house you can share the same air as this creature! I just stood and watched this bird for a bit and it was glorious.
What fools we are to be so busily destroying the planet that created the great blue heron. We have been given the gift of a universe with so many amazing things in it and all we can do is drive it, and ourselves, off a cliff. Being granted the chance to witness the heron is almost more than we deserve.
On the other hand, there’s evidence of great blue herons going back almost two million years. They were here long, long before us, and they could be here long, long after us. I’d like to think that they can help find a way to restore some balance to this place. For now, I’m simply grateful that this one heron let me look at it for a little while. And that’s why it’s the Bird of the Week.
Update: My mother texted me, “Nice to see our homeboy heron in the nationwide Discourse Blog!” and I love the phrase “homeboy heron” so much I had to add it here.
A reminder: you can check out our complete Bird of the Week list here, and get in touch with your bird suggestions at hello@discourseblog.com.
Homeboy heron!
All hail the mighty great blue heron! This is my favorite bird in my favorite family (Ardeidae, home to herons, egrets, and bitterns). I have told students (and others) that great blue herons are my favorite because, like me, they are tall, awkward, and really enjoy eating fish.
We went down to Brownsville this spring and went to the Birding and Nature Center there, where we watched a great blue heron catch a rather large fish and spend about five minutes trying to figure out if and how it could swallow it. It succeeded in the end, but there were certainly moments where it clearly thought, "MY GOD, WHAT HAVE I DONE?" and rued the choices that led it to this moment in life.
Also, herons basically have knives for faces, which makes them extra badass.
This is my favorite non-shoebill stork bird. Every time I see one in the nearby park, I feel like I just got a little treat. And when I see them eat a mouse, that's a double treat (e.g. https://www.instagram.com/p/C97fxPaMJoI/)