Rookery

On Wednesday Steve Uffman and I visited a rookery near Ville Platte, Louisiana.  From a raised road we looked across a lake at great egrets sitting on eggs, but some where already with half grown chicks.  They feed the babies by regurgitating fish which is quite exciting to watch.  These chicks are eating and growing machines. Some of the egrets were still displaying their breeding plumage.  The fans of long white feather shinning in the early morning sunlight were beautiful.

Great egret on nest

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I will be teaching a workshop here in two weeks check out the Rookery Workshop.

The beautiful roseate spoonbill

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In the same trees were amazingly colored roseate spoonbills. These birds were a little behind the great egrets in maternal duties as they were mainly building nests, bobbing their spatulated bills for their mating dance.  I got a nice video of two spoonbills mating of which I will post on Facebook soon.