Is it wrong of me to always think “they’re not that green” and wish the Green Heron had a different name?

The Chunky Skulking Heron? The Slate-Capped Purple-Necked Heron? The Lurking Heron?

This one was at Indian Riverside Park the other day.

Green Herons are common and widespread, but they can be hard to see at first. Whereas larger herons tend to stand prominently in open parts of wetlands, Green Herons tend to be at the edges, in shallow water, or concealed in vegetation. Visit a wetland and carefully scan the banks looking for a small, hunch-backed bird with a long, straight bill staring intently at the water. Their harsh skeow call is also a good clue. 

At another part of the pond, an Anhinga was perched for feather drying.

The most common bird in the park, Columbia livia, the Rock Pigeon.

Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets and Egyptian hieroglyphics suggest that pigeons were domesticated more than 5,000 years ago. The birds have such a long history with humans that it’s impossible to tell where the species’ original range was.