Tag Archives: Egrets

Egrets and turbines

Egrets and turbines

Today marks the 1,000th post on this blog. To mark the occasion I looked for a suitably appropriate subject and couldn’t find anything! So instead I chose this photo since it featured a couple of subjects I must have seen a thousand times.

I pass the turbines at Hawi Wind Farm on my way to the part of the coast where I regularly walk. And I’ve seen an awful lot of cattle/horse/sheep/goat/lawn mower egrets since they are omnipresent. Plus I have a soft spot for them.

In this photo, a flock of egrets is on a mission to get from one pasture to another one. They aren’t the most graceful of flyers, but en masse I find they make a very pleasing sight.

Stampede

When I’m out walking I often pass fields of cattle. In general they either stare dolefully or run off when I look at them. Recently though, I was walking alongside one field and, at my appearance, the cattle ran to one side of the field, formed a group and then thundered down the hill toward me. When they got close, they did a U-turn and shot back up the hill.

Next day they did the same thing, but this time instead of the U-turn they stopped just across the hedge from me and stared. All the running about had stirred up the cattle egrets that invariably accompany them and that’s when I took this photo. I particularly like the devilish horns of the one animal peering out from the crowd.

I moved on and the cattle followed. We repeated this a couple of times before they decided they’d had enough.

On the third day, my appearance provoked only dull stares. Obviously the thrill of my presence had gone.

Cattle egret hunting

A cattle egret wrestles with a green anole.A cattle egret wrestles with a green anole.

Another post on the theme of ‘Glow,’ this week’s WordPress photo challenge.

I looked out of the window early one morning, and saw this cattle egret staring intently, as they do, into fallen leaves bordering the yard. After a few minutes of that, a sudden lunge was followed by the top photo. That’s a green anole wrapped around the egret’s beak as it struggled, unsuccessfully, to get free. The photo on the left shows the egret swishing the anole back and forth, in an effort to finish it off.

I doubt the anole was happy, but the egret certainly glowed in the morning light.

Cattle and egrets

A cow chats with two cattle egrets.

I’m not sure one could call cows and cattle egrets friends. When cows graze, cattle egrets snaffle bugs stirred up in that process, but I don’t know of anything the egrets do for the cows in return.

However, this photo has a friendly feel to it. I picture the cow saying, ‘So you can fly, right? Could you teach me how?’ The egrets look suitably nonplussed at the suggestion.

Feel free to suggest your own caption in the comments.

Cattle egret on a cow

A cattle egret stands on a resting cow.
Something about the gleam in this egret’s eye made me think about an old Far Side cartoon where two fishermen are in a boat and one has hooked a cow in the water. The other fisherman says, “It’s gonna be fresh burgers tonight!” Mind you, I think the cow might have had a thing or two to say about that.

Cattle egrets

A cattle egret checks in with its cow.A cattle egret in a pasture
Cattle egrets are a common sight, particularly in rural areas. The name comes from their tendency to spend a good deal of time with cattle and other large mammals. Not only do they feed on insects and other small creatures disturbed by the cattle, but they also eat ticks and flies on the cattle themselves.

They’re not tied to cattle though. I’ve seen them trailing people mowing lawns for the same reason. That’s to snap up the insects disturbed by the activity, not peck for ticks on the person driving the mower.

When I see them in a field, by themselves, such as in the photo below, I always imagine them saying something along the lines of, ‘Hey, where did the cattle go?’

Cattle egrets in a field