Great Blue Heron Couple

Great Blue Heron Couple... more

by Melly Terpening

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Price

Not Specified

Dimensions

14.000 x 10.000 inches

Title

Great Blue Heron Couple

Artist

Melly Terpening

Medium

Painting - Watercolor On Paper

Description

Great Blue Heron Couple
This species usually breeds in colonies, in trees close to lakes or other wetlands. Adults generally return to the colony site after winter from December (in warmer climes such as California and Florida) to March (in cooler areas such as Canada). Usually colonies include only great blue herons though sometimes they nest alongside other species of herons. These groups are called heronry (a more specific term than "rookery"). The size of these colonies may be large, ranging between 5–500 nests per colony, with an average of approximately 160 nests per colony. Heronry are usually relatively close, usually within 4 to 5 km (2.5 to 3.1 mi), to ideal feeding spots.[19] Heronry sites are usually difficult to reach on foot (e.g., islands, trees in swamps, high branches, etc.) in order to protect from potential mammalian predators. Trees of any type are used when available. When not, herons may nest on the ground, sagebrush, cacti, channel markers, artificial platforms, beaver mounds and duck blinds. Other waterbirds (especially smaller herons) and, occasionally, even fish and mammal-eating raptors may nest amongst colonies.[26][27] Although nests are often reused for many years and herons are socially monogamous within a single breeding season, individuals usually choose new mates each year.[18] Males arrive at colonies first and settle on nests, where they court females; most males choose a different nest each year.[18] Great blue herons build a bulky stick nest. Nests are usually around 50 cm (20 in) across when first constructed, but can grow to more than 120 cm (47 in) in width and 90 cm (35 in) deep with repeated use and additional construction.[28] If the nest is abandoned or destroyed, the female may lay a replacement clutch. Reproduction is negatively affected by human disturbance, particularly during the beginning of nesting. Repeated human intrusion into nesting areas often results in nest failure, with abandonment of eggs or chicks.

The female lays three to six pale blue eggs. Eggs can measure from 50.7 to 76.5 mm (2.00 to 3.01 in) in length and 29 to 50.5 mm (1.14 to 1.99 in) in width, though the smallest eggs in the above sample may have been consider "runt eggs" too small to produce viable young. Egg weigh range from 61 to 80 g (2.2 to 2.8 oz).[29] One brood is raised each year. First broods are laid generally from March to April.[30][31] Eggs are usually laid at 2 day intervals, incubated for around 27 days and hatch asynchronously over a period of several days.[18] Males incubate for about 10.5 hours of each day while females usually incubate for the remainder of each day and the night, with eggs left without incubation for about 6 minutes of each hour.[18] The first chick to hatch usually becomes more experienced in food handling and aggressive interactions with siblings, and so often grows more quickly than the other chicks.[32] Both parents feed the young at the nest by regurgitating food. Parent birds have been shown to consume up to four times as much food when they are feeding young chicks (about 4300 kJ/day) than when laying or incubating eggs (about 1200 kJ/day).[18] By the time they are 45 days old, the young weigh 86% of the adult's mass.[33] After about 55 days at the northern edge of the range (Alberta) and 80 days at the southern edge of the range (California), young herons take their first flight.[18] They will return to the nest to be fed for about another 3 weeks, following adults back from foraging grounds and are likely to gradually disperse away from their original nest over the course of the ensuing winter.[18] Young herons are not as successful at fish capture as adults, as strike rates are similar but capture rates about half that of adults during the first 2 months post-fledging.[18]
--Source:Wikipedia--

Uploaded

March 2nd, 2015