There is also currently a Little Blue Heron at Smith River in Del Norte
County California (on the California - Oregon Border)

The Ridgefield NWR Washington bird is an interesting case - the lack of
really clear and consistent photos makes this no easier. I'm going to try
to go down and see the bird on Friday if I can break away from work. I've
seen great numbers of both Snowys and Little Blues and I do love an ID
challenge. From the evidence I've seen I'm leaning Snowy Blue Little
Heron-Egret. :-) Well, actually I'm about 95% certain we're looking at a
Snowy Egret.

Diagnostically here's what I'm getting from the available info:

Lores: The lores on this bird are yellow - every photo consistently shows
this. This is consistent with Snowy Egret. Immature Little Blues show
blue-gray lores - no yellow.

Legs/Feet: This bird (IMHO) has the classic bi-colored (black front- yellow
back) legs of an immature Snowy - the picture angles themselves show this -
notice the only part of a leg showing yellow is the back? Little Blues have
consistently colored blue/grey legs - I've seen occassional birds with
"yellowish" knees - but nothing in terms of yellow legs that the Ridgefield
bird is sometimes showing. I've also never seen a LBHE with yellow or even
yellowish feet. Some of the pictures show yellow feet to me.

Bill: This one is a little more puzzling, and could trip (or tip, pun
intended) some up. This bird is showing a classic immature Snowy Egret
bill. Though in some pictures the bill appears to have a dark tip I think
that is easily attributed to the area it is feeding in (lots of mud) as well
as wet-dry differences. Mostly what I see is, again, yellow. I've never
seen a Little Blue of any age with significant yellow in its bill - the
light color in an immature LBHE bill is greyish green - there are some bad
illustrations around, but photos of birds all show gray/blue light areas -
there are likely exceptions but lets talk Occam's Razor - what is most
likely probably is. This bird shows yellow in several photos.

Wingtips: Immature Little Blues show dusky wingtips about 60-75% of the
time. This bird is white.

Behavior: Most all have described active and animated feeding behavior
including "chasing". Little Blues just normally don't do this. Snowy's do
this a lot - they feed in open water and they shuffle their feet and run and
flap their wings to get their prey out of hiding. The difference here could
be where the bird is feeding - I have most often seen LBHE feeding more at
waters edge - they stalk, they don't agitate. Who knows what a LBHE might
do in more open water?

A note on color: It is fairly easy to turn yellow to black or with mud or
shadow. It is hard to turn black (or blue/grey) to yellow. If yellow is
showing it is there - and if its not then that could be a trick of shadow,
or dirt. There is a lot of yellow in the photos, 95% probability of a Snowy
Egret. I'd love it to be a Little Blue - I could use that on my Washington
list!

One last wrench...are we sure we don't have one of each? :-) !!

Cheers and good birding

Rob

Rob Conway
Newcastle & Preston, WA

robin_birder at hotmail.com





>From: "Wilson Cady" <gorgebirds at juno.com>
>To: godwit513 at msn.com
>CC: tweeters at u.washington.edu, obol at lists.oregonstate.edu
>Subject: [Tweeters] Re: [obol] Snowy Egret discussion
>Date: Wed, 6 Sep 2006 22:22:14 GMT
>
>Birders,
> Scott Carpenter has graciously posted my photos at:
>http://www.westerngrebe.com/Ridgefield/
>
> As far as records of Little Blue Heron in the Northwest, there was
>one this summer at the Tualitin NWR, just South of Portland.
>
>
>Wilson Cady
>Washougal, WA
>
>
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>Tweeters mailing list
>Tweeters at u.washington.edu
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