Swampy Observations

 

I visited a local swamp more than once this month looking for birds and whatever else nature had to offer. 

The water here is full of dead trees and stumps and an initial survey of the area doesn't reveal much life. But like this wonderful Tree Face, it is certain that you are being watched by many motionless creatures. Only when you make yourself comfortable on a fallen tree trunk and wait..., you start to see the many birds that call this area home. 

There is a Great Blue Heron nest in this picture. Herons tend to build nests in a colony called a heronry or heron rookery. I have never seen a single Great Blue Heron nest before. A photographer in a local birding group posted a picture of this nest and another birder commented that there couldn't be a solitary nest in this particular swamp! But they were wrong.

Three young birds occupied the nest and while they stood on the tree branches, none of them were ready to fly. These large herons do not fledge until they are about 60 days old and may stay in the nest for up to three months. 

I waited for about an hour and saw one of the parents return with a fish. There was a lot of excitement in the nest for a few minutes before the adult bird flew off again. The nest was quite a distance from the spot of land where I stood and the photos were taken with a lot of zoom.

While I watched the Great Blue Heron nest, I noticed several other young birds who made their home in the same swamp. 

Juvenile Red-bellied Woodpecker

Adult Grey Catbird preparing to feed a very noisy fledgling in the same tree

Juvenile Swamp Sparrow

Juvenile American Robin

The weather in our area has been perfect this month. We had a few warm, humid days with temperatures in the low 30s C but the average temperatures have been moderate. Regular rainfall has kept farmers happy, lawns green and gardens lush. The newsfeed gives another story about extended heat waves, high ocean temperatures, severe flooding, and wildfires in other parts of Canada and the world. Yet there are people I know who mock the science that measures global warming because we have not had record-breaking temperatures or extreme weather locally this year.

I have been contemplating the differences between fact and truth. The Great Blue Heron nest in the swamp was a proven fact. Truth can be based on facts, but it also includes belief. The birder who commented that the nest could not be there based an opinion on their experience and the most common habits of these birds. Their truth did not line up with the facts. Witnesses in court, while telling their truth, may give different accounts of the same event. One may notice details another missed, confirmation or cultural biases may impact perceptions, and memory can be unreliable. Facts, as presented, are deliberated in an attempt to discover the truth. 

It is challenging to discern the truth as we are often bombarded with conflicting data and opinions. Whether it is global warming, Covid prevention and treatment, local or celebrity gossip, political intrigue, health advice, and more, we can be deceived if we are not diligent to check the facts, and open-minded enough to recognize the impact of our biases and beliefs.

People will generally accept facts as truth only if 

the facts agree with what they already believe.

Andy Rooney

My daughter added this comment after reading this post...

“It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled”. Possibly paraphrased from this Mark Twain quote— “How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo that work again!"