Mecklenburg County Tourist?

[monsoon]

This bird flew into my backyard and hung out on my deck for a while this morning. We get eagles, hawks and owls all the time, but his is the first time I have seen one of these. Do any of you urbanites have any idea what kind of bird this might be and if it is native to Mecklenburg? It was just short of about 3ft tall so it was quite sizeable.

[A2]

It's a Blue Heron MB. You must live close to the lake. Do you??? Their natural habitat is close to rivers and lakes up and down the east coast. I used to see them all the time in AL, when I lived on the lake down there. They are quite a site if you have never seen one before. What's really neat is watching them eat. I hhave seen them eat 2 and three pound fish whole !

http://bss.sfsu.edu/holzman/courses/Fall99Projects/heron.htm

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt...hl%3Den%26lr%3D

A2

[ilektronik]

A2 is corrent. I have seen a few of those in my backyard.

[f0xym0p]

Neat. I would be more than a little shocked if I saw one of those on my patio. Glad you were able to get the photos.

[DigitalSky]

Nice Pics.. nice looking backyard too

[peaceloveunderstanding]

a beautiful bird, I have never seen one in a yard but they are quite visible in the lakes and marshes.

[ezcheese]

my girlfriend's parents have a pond behind their house off of providence road and they have herons and other visitors pretty often. they keep a set of binoculars handy in their enclosed porch for the special occasions when these guys show up.

[monsoon]

Thanks everyone for the information on what kind of bird this is. He (or she) was quite camera shy and once he figured off I was looking at him quickly flew off. Amazing that such a big creature can take off like it did.

[monsoon]

Ok things are a little slow here so I thought I would post another bird photo from my backyard. This photo is not as clear as I don't have a telephoto lens and this particular raptor decided to stay in the top of the trees.

(Did anyone go to the Earth Day celebration this weekend at the Carolina Raptor Center this weekend?)

[cinco]

Ok things are a little slow here so I thought I would post another bird photo from my backyard. This photo is not as clear as I don't have a telephoto lens and this particular raptor decided to stay in the top of the trees.

(Did anyone go to the Earth Day celebration this weekend at the Carolina Raptor Center this weekend?)

nice owl! hey, is that a willow oak tree he's perched in?

[Rickydavisfan21]

wow gorgeous bird

[cinco]

^ sorry, is that even an owl.... or is a hawk... i can't tell.

[Rickydavisfan21]

neither I think its a peregrine falcon, they are usually online in dt charlotte tho in this area

[monsoon]

nice owl! hey, is that a willow oak tree he's perched in?

I don't think he is an owl, but that is a willow oak. There are some owls living in those woods as I hear them hooting in the evening, but they are very shy.

[Rickydavisfan21]

once again its a peregrine falcon, you can tell by the spots on the breast and wings, I think he's actually an endangered species, don't know what he's doing at lake norman, they usually don't venture out of downtown, they often inhabit the tops of skysrapers, I remember the last two I saw were on the tops of buildings, in city club in the interstate tower, and on top of Bofa visiting it when I had a field trip when I took the summer design camp at UNCC

[monsoon]

I wonder where they lived before they built the buildings in Charlotte.

[Rickydavisfan21]

well they weren't really spotted very often until BoFa came around, at least not as often, my dad told me that when his company was building the big juke box they saw one that took a lil break, they make one of their paths through the NC mountains, they like being at high up places so they can see their prey better, they have excellent vision, and can see thing from hundreds of yards away. They are seen very often in NYC, baltimore, Philadelphia, and Chicago, as well and Charlotte. Yea whatever I don't need to explain anymore I can find a migration map pretty easily

here is their migratorion path map.

http://rrc.boisestate.edu/Past%20Projects/...ation%20map.htm

[monsoon]

Well its obvious the birds don't need skyscrapers to exist as the birds have been here a lot longer than those type of buildings.

In anycase, the bird above does not look like this.

[Rickydavisfan21]

yea after looking at the face, its differnet but there are many falcons that look like that, birds don't all look alike, just like people, not all peregrines look like that, but all have a very simliar feather pattern as the one pictured in your picture. Common mistake my bad I'm a bird lover and If I am wrong I appologize

this is the kind I was thinking of

a lot of the markings are correct for a peregrine, but unfortnately I wasn't there to witness the bird so I can't make an accurate observation without seeing a better upclose picture.