SURFIN' BIRD

I still sleep in my childhood bedroom on visits to my Gulf Coast hometown. I saw through the side yard window a startling bird. Crane-looking. It gobbled a frog! Later, my husband saw a mate. They had a nest, visible in a nearby tree.

Heavy rain, my Dad suggested, had perhaps caused them to mistake our soggy side yard for a wetlands.

Once upon a time this area, popular among birders (I am not one), boasted more bird species than anywhere else in the country. Overdevelopment may have ended that. This patch of communities is on the migration path between Canada and South America. This area was home, my elementary school teachers emphasized, to the near-extinct Whooping Crane. I was hoping these were Whoopers, but careful application of the search engine revealed them to be Yellow-Crowned Night Herons.

My Dad loaned us high-powered binoculars and we had a birding experience from the comfort of the bedroom. Watch out for that cat prowling below the tree! Our camera, sadly, is not high-powered so you cannot get a good sight of this creature which looks more exotic than the locale would warrant, more African or South American than North American with its yellow top cowlick and bright red eyes.

Tried and failed to get a great pic not in copyright, so I will offer an URL for a cool Cajun Yellow-Crowned Night Heron munching on a crawfish, much as I did on my visit South.
http://www.birdsasart.com/Yellow-crowned-Night-Heron-warmer-crawfish-very-best-Lk-Martin-La-_H2D2188.jpg