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#EgretsIveHadAFew

There was something about the quality of the light on the river yesterday afternoon (bright, a little smoky), and the stillness of the river where the egret was keeping watch, that made this feel like a Magritte sort of egret, like e was just magically floating a hair's breadth above the water.

#EgretsIveHadAFew #MagrittesIveNone

Sunday morning at the Crossroads.

#EgretsIveHadAFew

I was so drawn in by the peculiar beauty of these snowy egrets by the river today (my first spotting!). They were mixing with the much larger great egrets that I usually watch at this particular hunting ground, and if I'd been in a hurry, I might have missed them. Their movements reminded me of contemporary dancers as they picked their way over the rocks to drum up their breakfasts. #Oregon #Ballet #EgretsIveHadAFew

@BranwenOShea It's a rookery! This tree is one of several on the hillside above a lake, and it's where a large number of the egrets in my area are nesting this summer! If you check the hashtag #EgretsIveHadAFew, I've posted several photos of some of the nests and baby birds there as well. It's truly a thing to behold!

Repost from earlier this summer:

This is a recording of the parent and baby egrets up on the mountainside trail where I often take photographs of them nesting in the trees. The recording quality is not awesome, but it should give an idea of what raucous, possessed creatures they are. Dancers in the breeze, demons in the trees.

#EgretsIveHadAFew

@Diogeneslamp0 #EgretsIveHadAFew 😉

Strike like a serpent, pose like a swan.

#EgretsIveHadAFew

It's a triumph just to be alive.

#EgretsIveHadAFew

@handmade_ghost Would boost if the toot was just the #EgretsIveHadAFew tag.

“You’re not Great! You’re only Grand, which just means ‘big’! Get out of here ya Big Egret!”

#birding
#EgretsIveHadAFew

Lots of sibling drama on the egret trail today. I can hardly believe these elegant, hilarious juveniles are the same three I photographed in June as tiny, shaggy peeps. Those are their parents at the end of this video, trying to have a quiet morning while the kids are downstairs arguing over whose turn it is to do the dishes.

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Birds #Oregon

Family meeting. #EgretsIveHadAFew #Oregon

I am excited to report that new baby egrets are still joining the now-nearly-fledged little noisemakers of yesterday's posts. Here are three of the newer babies looking around from their safety seats in the shade of their parent early this morning.

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Birds #Nests #Oregon

Some of the baby great egrets I've been watching these past few weeks are getting close to fledging! Here are a pair of them using their words and tidying their feathers. They are tremendously gawky and cute (imho).

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Birding #Oregon

Here is one of the harried egret parents of the hatchlings my daughter and I have been watching on a local mountainside. E seems to be taking a break from tending the nest (eir partner stayed behind with the littles) to stretch eir wings and literally shake a tailfeather.

#Birds #Oregon #EgretsIveHadAFew

Here is a better view of a parent great egret feeding one of eir babies up in the swaying pines this time last year (to make up for the fact they're more obscured by needles and branches around their nests this year in the previous post). 2/2

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Oregon

Baby egrets are the Tom-Waits-iest, scroungiest, funkiest little babies. They were making a fantastic ruckus up in the trees this morning (in honor of @loren's birthday).

Anyway, the pines this year are way more lush than this time last year, so it was hard to pin down clear shots in the midst of all the fans and needles, but I did my best because Baby Egrets.

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Birds #Oregon

Great egrets--and one American white pelican--gallivanting about the lake reservoir while occasionally pretending not to.

#Birds #Oregon #EgretsIveHadAFew

I spent yesterday morning watching the egrets in the nearby rookery again. They are getting harder to photograph, as the trees have become full with springtime, and many of the egrets are now settled into their nests. But I love glimpsing them through the trees.

#EgretsIveHadAFew #Birds #Oregon #Komorebi