(Rehoboth Beach, DE)
I always, well, almost always, take my camera to the marina with me. On the 16th I didn’t. I am kickin’ myself now. I even looked at it before I left that morning and thought to myself, “Nah, I’m going to take that today.”
Across from the marina, close enough to see plainly, there is an island. A small island to be sure but its loaded with wildlife. There is a foot bridge that one can cross to go over from the marina to the island to explore it if one wishes to fight off the mosquitoes and ticks. To give you an idea of how close, or far away, this island is, if someone was walking over there you would see a person but wouldn’t be able to tell who it was.
I was sitting in the golf cart and happened to look over to the island and was looking at these rather large white things all over this stand of trees. There had to be twenty – twenty five of these white blobs. They didn’t move they just seemed to be attached to the trees. I had never seen anything like this all summer and I look over to the island quite frequently as its in the line of sight from the ramp area. I couldn’t tell what it was and just sat there looking trying to figure it out.
I didn’t even notice the boat that was being put in and was startled when the lady came over to ask a question. I must have jumped when she spoke to me because she said something on the order of…. you sure are deep in thought there… . I pointed to the white blobs and asked her if she knew what it was. She was just as surprised as me and couldn’t figure it out either. She called her husband over and asked him if he knew what it was. It was while we were standing there looking, trying to figure out what these large white blobs were, that one moved. They have heads! On long white necks. Come to find out from one of the dock hands that they were Snowy Egrets! Typically, these aren’t big birds so we’re thinking they were spreading their wings for some reason. I have never seen them in the trees before, just walking through the shallow area or flying in or out. He went on to tell us that they do this a couple of times while they’re here and he doesn’t know why. He said I should see them in the trees for a few days and then I won’t. Just my luck, they were in the trees the past two days. This may be the only day I’ll get to see it and my camera is at home. The lady who was going boating did take a picture with her phone but I was longing for my Canon and telephoto lens.
The egrets hung around the trees most of the morning and then I looked and they were all gone. I’m hoping they’ll be there again so I can get a picture.
This wasn’t the only strange thing with the birds today. A blue heron visited the ramp in the afternoon and that is most unusual as the herons hang out at the island or in the shallow waters.
As luck would have it, I took the camera the next day and when I arrived there were two egrets in the trees. I waited hoping more would arrive. Of course then the ramp got busy and I didn’t pay the island any mind the rest of the morning. Saturday? NO birds in the trees.
(Note to self: TAKE the camera!)
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