Is that a green heron?

"Is that a green heron?"

A small, noisy little bird went flashing by me while Sue and our daughter, Miriam, and grandson, James, were birding in Phoenix a couple of weeks back.

One of the best things about being a birder is that no matter where anyone goes, there is always the opportunity to add a "Lifer" to one's Life List, especially in the American Southwest. During the time Sue and I spent in southeast Arizona in the late '70s and early '80s - while I was the head honcho of Ramsey Canyon Preserve, AKA "The Hummingbird Capitol of the World" - many beautiful birds made it onto our Life List, among them the Berylline Hummingbird, a rare species from Mexico and Central America.

I particularly recall the Berylline, as it was only the second known nesting pair observed in the USA; I found their nest on the preserve high up in a sycamore and wouldn't tell ANYONE about it.

(The first breeding pair for the U.S. was discovered at the S.W. Research Station in the Chiricahua's over near the New Mexico border a couple of years before. That one failed because it was loved-to-death by thousands of birders who came to add the species to their Life List. Slob birders in my book.)

It was also in southeast Arizona that the green heron made it onto my Life List. I discovered it at the sewage ponds in Nogales, Arizona, right on the Mexico border. I didn't do it by myself, however; our dear friend and fellow birder Carroll Caleb Peabody - who owned Ramsey Canyon and gave it to the Nature Conservancy just prior to our arrival - took my arm when we arrived at the sewage ponds, and said, "Follow me; I want to show you something special."

Like most birders, he knew the mud bank the little heron would be standing on and what time of day. He also gave me the green kingfisher the same day.

The green heron is a small heron of North and Central America, and long considered conspecific with its close relative, the striated heron; together they were known as the green-backed heron - the source of constant argument/discussion among the more serious bird-naming folk.

Early Pleistocene fossil remains discovered in Florida might have been the ancestor of the green heron, as the living species seems to replace the extinct relative in the fossil record.

Though seen as far north as Ontario, Canada, in summer, green herons are extremely rare vagrants to western Europe, while individuals from the Pacific region of North America may stray as far as Hawaii. (Going to Hawaii means a non-stop flight - a miraculous journey - just like the snowy owl that did it last year, only to be shot for getting in the way of air traffic on the airport runway.)

The green heron is relatively small when compared to the great blue heron; the adult body length is about 17 inches, with neck often pulled in tight against the body, and short, rounded wings measuring to about 24 inches.

Adults are (to me) very colorful. They have a glossy, greenish-black cap, a greenish back and marbling on the wings that are grey-black grading into green or blue, a chestnut neck with a white line down the front, grey underparts, and short yellow legs.

The bill - perfectly designed for spearing fish, snakes and frogs - is dark, with a long, sharp point.

The green heron is also unique in that it often uses "bait" to catch it's prey. They will drop small leaves or insects on the surface of the pond and when a fish or amphibian comes up to investigate, they'll spear them with that rapier-like bill.

The green heron's call is a loud and sudden "kyow;" (what I heard as it flew by me at the Papago Park pond). It also makes a series of more subdued "kuk" calls. During courtship, the male gives a "raah-rahh" call with wide-open bill, makes noisy wingbeats and "whoom-whoom-whoom" calls in flight, and sometimes calls "roo-roo" to the female before landing again.

With climate change well underway, perhaps one of these fine days I'll get an out-of-breath cell phone call from John Gerke, or Mary Smith, when one of them spots a green heron at one of the Camp Polk ponds.