Skip to content
The Broadsheet
Menu
  • Current Issue
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Archive
  • Contact Us
Menu

‘Egrets, We’ve Had a Few…’

Posted on September 27, 2018February 5, 2019

Downtown dweller Patrick Sheldon was the first of several readers to report on Lower Manhattan’s newest celebrity resident: an as-yet-unnamed Great Egret. Spotted for the first time at a paddle-board race at North Cove Marina on September 25, this majestic creature was seen stalking a mouse. (Egrets, like all herons, subsist on fish, frogs, and small mammals and reptiles—all of which it spears with its long, sharp bill.) This specimen appears to have a four-foot-plus wingspan, which is about mid-range for its species, Casmerodius albus. The Great Egret was nearly hunted to extinction in the 1800s, when the fashion industry craved its plumes for the ladies’ hat trade. But conservationists scored an early victory by combatting hunters and protecting colonies, thus inspiring the creation of the National Audubon Society, which adopted the noble bird as its official symbol. More recently, he has been observed near the Irish Hunger Memorial, on Murray Street, at the Oval Lawn near Brookfield Place, watching the grass being cut in Rockefeller Park, and dodging curious children on Gateway Plaza’s ring road. Here’s wishing him better luck than Zelda, the wild turkey who lived in Lower Manhattan for almost a decade, before becoming a traffic fatality in 2014.

Another sighting and a few words from Tom Lake, of the Hudson River Almanac:

 

“Great Egrets are in full autumn migration right now. They are liable to be anywhere.

I am certain there are some at Inwood Park, in Central Park, and along the river off the west side of Manhattan at low tide.

Right now the entire estuary is glutted with many millions of young-of-year river herring, shad, and striped bass. The egret’s migration, as well as the fishes migration, is part of the wonderful timing, a delicate balance, that we recognize in the river. ”

 

The Hudson River Almanac, a collection of observations related to the river, is compiled and edited by Tom Lake, Hudson River Estuary Program Naturalist

 

——————————————————————————————-

 

September 24 ~  Downtown resident Patrick Sheldon reports a sighting:

Meet the Great Egret, also known as the Common Egret. That long neck is pulled in when he flies and those wings appeared to be more than 4 feet across in the air. The egret can have 4-5 foot wingspans.

He appeared the day of the Paddle Board Races (Sept. 25th) and there were more than the usual number of visitors  gathered at the North Cove Marina and the Esplanade for that event.  But egrets are used to being near people, and this one had a target:  a very young mouse running through the planter.
After a couple of hours, he was gone. But I did see the mouse later, so apparently he gave up.
This week, a white egret was spotted near the Irish Hunger Memorial, so this guy may become a regular.
———————————————————————————————

 

Editor’s note: The Broadsheet has received several reports, (sometimes panicked calls), of sightings of this particular bird walking around Tribeca, along the esplanade, in Oval Park and other locations in Battery Park City.

 

 

(Visited 252 times, 1 visits today)

Share this:

  • Share
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Print
  • Email

Search

Categories

  • Classifieds and Personals
  • Letters
  • Letters
  • The Arts
  • Today In History
  • Uncategorized

Archive

©2023 The Broadsheet | WordPress Theme by Superbthemes.com