urban birds

May 18, 2026

Sara Kate Wilkinson

Sara Kate Wilkinson

— 5 min read
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May 18, 2026
Bird of the Day: great blue heron, seraphic.

Where: Huntley Meadows Park

When: 6:20 am

Bird Species: summer tanager, European starling, eastern phoebe, American robin, tufted titmouse, Carolina chickadee, red-headed woodpecker, blue-gray gnatcatcher, orchard oriole, eastern bluebird, eastern kingbird, green heron, great blue heron, osprey, hooded merganser, spotted sandpiper, barn swallow, Canada goose, mallard, wood duck, northern cardinal, ruby-throated hummingbird, common grackle, red-winged blackbird, barn swallow

Things I Thought About:

  • It is humid and warm enough to take off your overshirt and tie it around your waist at 7:12 am, it gives me no pleasure to note.
  • The 7:00 am bird walk has started. I sometimes join them, this organized collection of mostly seniors who do a loop and a count every Monday morning, but a lot of the fun for me is seeing what I can discover on my own, so I am both running ahead and lagging behind this group for a lot of this first section of the trail.
  • Not that I'm above picking up hints. If they're all looking at a tree, I'd be foolish not to look at the same tree. If they get excited about something, I can sidle up close but not too close and hear what they're excited about (in this case, the prothonotary warbler, who is much too far away this early in the morning for me to attempt a photo.)
  • In much the same way, by being casual and unobtrusive, one can sometimes steal a Ghost Tour.
  • Hey, my first green heron of the year! I watched him go down and collect what I thought was a fish, but as he raised his head out of the water, legs unfold, to a length almost longer than the bird. This little heron has absolutely mangled a frog. I bet he's too far away for photos, and also I bet the photos will be gross.
Yes to both. What you are seeing here is a situation where the lower part of his long bill has gone straight down, and straight through this frog, shish kabob style. He then spent easily ten minutes trying to figure out how to eat him. It was very gnarly and very cool. Good bird, the green heron is. I wish he had been closer.
  • It is so sunny today that everything looks slightly overexposed, not the least the back of my neck, where I forgot sunscreen.
  • I'm going to say something controversial: I think wood ducks are fugly.
This duck looks like one of those very high-strung tall dogs, like the one Petunia the goose set on fire in the children's book. Everyone knows what I'm talking about!!
  • I got here just in time for breakfast. There are two ospreys fishing, and one is a much better fisherman than the other. Five dives, with three clean misses from the one.
He looks so proud, he's almost making eye contact with me. I can't believe I got to watch five dives today. Incredible bird.
  • And here is some straight up pornography on the boardwalk. Those orchard orioles are mating, and it is NSFBlog. I can't post these sex photos. "Cloacas gaping," she thought, and instantly regretted that combination of words.
Here is a tasteful photo of the pursuit in advance of the live oriole sex show. DM for explicit content, I guess? (don't do that, creeps)
  • And immediately the lady is collecting nesting material which, girl. Wait for a second date, maybe. You don't even know if he likes you.
Post-coital cotton candy, another unfortunate combination of words, and of ideas.
  • This bird is a frog. I know we're all here for birds, but if you are holding a camera how do you not take a photo of a smiling frog? It would be unnatural.
Ribbit.
  • Wowzers, it got hot early today. And it's very bright and the sky is a very pale blue from the heat and haze.
There isn't very much to this photo, just two eastern bluebirds chilling on a snag, but part of what I love so much about this park is the range and the scale. There are plenty of large, superstar birds like the ospreys and the herons, but I love how you can see small birds absolutely dwarfed by the scenery but still startlingly present. I took the photos of today's GBH while standing in the exact same spot.
  • Oh! I had heard a rumor that the female wood duck had abandoned her nest (probably because she knew her children would grow up to look like a wet Borzoi) but it seems that she did not!
Dad might have abandoned them, though. He did not look equipped to parent septuplets.
  • The honeysuckle on the woods trail smells delicious. It is such a perfect summertime scent, sweet and green at the same time. A lovely accompaniment to a shady walk after the heat of the boardwalk.
  • I love it out here. I have not looked at my phone or thought about much of anything except sight, sound and scent since I got here.
  • I have developed a sweat ring on this T-shirt collar at 9:10 am, though.

BOTD: the great blue heron. I give them a hard time for being boring and Muppet-y when they just stand around, but they are an incredibly dynamic bird in motion, fishing and flying, which this one did both of.

He was just beautiful, is all.

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