{"id":12074,"date":"2025-05-27T16:46:28","date_gmt":"2025-05-27T15:46:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/?p=12074"},"modified":"2025-05-27T19:33:39","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T18:33:39","slug":"heronry-21-may","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/heronry-21-may\/","title":{"rendered":"Heronry. 21 May"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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At the beginning of May I went to St Aidans and Fairburn Ings<\/a> and contemplated walking round to the Herony at Fairburn Ings, but after having spent most of the day in the heat at St Aidans I actually only spent a few minutes at Fairburn Ings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I still wanted to see a Heronry so the other day I went looking for one. The obvious place to look is where decent sized trees are near water since these ungainly and leggy birds nest high up in trees. And my luck was in. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The header image is of two chicks attacking the beak of an adult to get at the food it has brought. While doing this the neck of the adults look much wider than normal. I assume this is due to the food being regurgitated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As usual you can tap\/touch\/click on an image, not its caption, to see it in better quality in the gallery. And if you like what you see please click on one or more of the Share <\/em>buttons at the bottom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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First Sighting<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Walking along by the river there were the usual sightings for this time of year. Damselflies, and further away from the river Speedwell and Chickweed, Buttercups and Daisies. Quite a few Orange Tip butterflies were around too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Several areas had shoals of Minnows. At the bottom left of the photo you can see another smaller shoal of tiny fish. Slightly further into the river shoals of larger fish, perhaps twice the size of these fish, could just be seen, but hazy brown against the brown water, so no photo. At one point a yet larger fish came swimming to the edge of this shoal and then darted away. Had it just grabbed one of the smaller fish?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When climbing out of the water the last Cygnet really struggled. The bank was no doubt slippery from all the others having climbed out before it. I don’t know how the adult would have helped but it quite definitely watched the struggle for a few seconds and then moved forward to help, but at last the little one made it on to the grass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was great to see the Grey Wagtail. Having read the article in the Lancashire Telegraph that they are rare and seldom seen it makes you more appreciative of each sighting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Banded Demoiselle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Speedwell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Chickweed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Minnows<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Swan and Cygnets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Swan and Cygnets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Greylag goose and Goslings<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Wagtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Wagtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Wagtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Wagtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Wagtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I could see a Heron nest with two Herons in it. The colouring meant they were chicks\/fledglings but they were BIG. Though I was looking through branches and leaves it became apparent that they could see me so I went to find a better hiding place and spotted more nests.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Fledging<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Some of the birds were moving about in the tree tops, flapping their wings, looking as though they were ready to go. This often left one in the nest but I didn’t keep track of them to see if once the fledgling returned to the nest it was the other one then went out. At least one had made it down to the water and was making a good job of catching and eating fish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
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Juvenile Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Fledgling Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

While in the nest the chicks would strike out at branch and give it a tug. Good practice for striking to catch fish. They also seemed to strike out at each other too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of the birds spent quite a bit of time preening but they seem to have very few fluffy down feathers left.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Feeding<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I have seen Herons stab through large Frogs before eating them so those long sharp beaks are very good weapons. With that in mind I then watched Heron chicks being fed by the adults. Putting your head inside those beaks looked very risky but I didn’t see any blood or damaged eyes, though you could see the nictitating membrane covering the eye on many occasions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Feeding Grey Herons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One of the photos shows the bird with its head on the side, beak wide open and a great pink tongue waving about.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Adults<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

These are the photos of the adults either coming in with their guts full of food for the youngsters or moving away from the nest to avoid the battle. There is one, having just fed its young, beak open, showing its tongue with notches that help them turn and swallow the fish head first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
Adult Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Adult Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Adult Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Adult Grey Heron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The adults differ from the young ones in that the tops of their heads are white, their legs are slightly yellow instead of the youngster’s grey, their adult beaks get more orangy in the breeding season and they have a blue patch on their shoulder.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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If you are using a phone the caption can take up most of the space of the thumbnail so you might find it easier to turn your phone to landscape to open the gallery. I am hoping to change that for the site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can also leave comments or subscribe to the site \u2013 leave your email address and you will get notified when I publish something new.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The images are published under the Creative Commons, BY-NC-SA<\/a> license. Feel free to share them, edit them, but please keep my name in the credits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If I have got the ID of anything wrong please let me know, I don’t consider myself an expert but I have to write something. It is often a best guess and it would take up too much room to say It could be this, or it could be… or perhaps<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Grey Heron chicks being fed at their Heronry on the river Aire. With those beaks it looks a risky business for them all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Grey Heron chicks being fed at their Heronry on the river Aire. With those beaks it looks a risky business for them all.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[145,195,42],"class_list":["post-12074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-paul","tag-grey-heron","tag-grey-wagtail","tag-river-aire"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/R7_C6623_21_01.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3kGoX-38K","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12074"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12176,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12074\/revisions\/12176"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marfell.me.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}