Tweeters,



I spent the morning at Lake Sammamish State Park to check in on the Herons. I know that they have been at the nests awhile so I observed them for about 45 minutes. The birds were bringing in nesting material, adding to existing nest, and displaying to each other. Very neat behavior to see. When a bird would join a pair one would raise the long black plumes on its head, fluff the long chest plumes, and stretch its neck straight up to towards the sky. It is comical to see them raise the black head plumes since they are so long and pointy. Other times they would just fluff the chest plumes and slowly extend the neck downward ending with a couple of snaps of the bill. I counted about 57 herons.



In other notes, I attempted to walk the trail to the mouth of Issaquah creek after crossing the bridge and found it completely covered in silt and mud. A small portion of the trail has succumbed to the creek and the Red-breasted Sapsucker nest snag has snapped off and fallen to the ground. Too bad as that was a very reliable and convenient site to observe and photograph active nests every year. If your out there Jeff you need to find us a new one! lol.



Amy Schillinger

Renton, WA

schillingera at hotmail.com



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