An egret seen (briefly) at Ashbridge’s Bay and a serendipitous find

Some days you just get lucky. It’s simple serendipity. (And I think it augurs well for the first day of summer. Hurray!)

I only had time for a short walk today, so decided to forego my camera equipment and just dashed out with my point and shoot to my closest park  — Ashbridge’s Bay — to see what was up. I was looking to see which birdies’ babies had fledged, if any more mallard babies had hatched, if the swans were around. Stuff like that. Turns out the mourning dove chicks (aka squabs) had left their nest at the end of the peanut, there were three new ducklings with their mom in the inlet by the path from the parking lot, and the swans, Penny and Tycho, were out in the Coatsworth Cut, feeding their cygnets. In other words, all was well at the bay.

Carrying on around the inner harbour, I saw a flash of pure white. I knew it wasn’t either of the swans, because I had already seen them in the Cut. And since the cygnets can’t fly yet, the only way they could have got around to the inner harbour would be by paddling there. Even if they had hopped up on mom or dad’s back for a ride, I don’t think they could have made it all the way there that quickly. So I was pretty excited — that white flash was probably a lone egret. A quick look with my binoculars proved my guess right.

There was in fact, a great white egret (Ardea alba) wading in the rocks in the exact same spot that Penny and Tycho had their nest for years — at the point on the far side (yacht club side) of the bay where the NO WAKE sign is. I don’t think I have EVER seen an egret in the inner harbour before, so this was seriously exciting. I wanted to document it, but with my small camera there was no way I could get a clear shot. I tried anyway, figuring something was better than nothing. I managed to get a couple of grainy, blurry and overexposed shots (mostly because I was on digital zoom with my point and shoot). But within moments, the great bird flew the few hundred metres over to my side of the bay again, (the boardwalk side) and disappeared around the corner into some bushes by the water.

Determined to get a better shot, I very quietly walked along the path to where I thought it might be fishing at the water’s edge. But the egret took off and with a few magnificent slow-motion flaps, flew back to the yacht club again. I took my eyes off the egret for a few moments to photograph a butterfly that was passing by (possibly some attention and/or focusing issues?) and by the time I went looking for the big bird again it had plum disappeared. (For the record, the butterfly was a large white, Pieris brassicae.)

I decided to look for the egret on the boardwalk side of the bay, and made my way through the fairly dense understory of saplings, bushes, grasses and wild roses to get to the edge of the water, where I thought I might see it. No dice. No egret. But I did run smack into something else white and stunning — a tree covered in white blooms that I had never seen before. That’s a picture of it at the top of this post.

Turns out the small tree I inadvertently found is a multiflora rose (Rosa multiflora.) As lovely as it is, it’s considered a noxious weed in at least 11 states and also in Ontario. Seems this small-flowered rose was introduced from Europe but escaped cultivation (it was/is sold as living hedge.) It is considered invasive, spreading into fields and pastures where it forms dense, impenetrable masses.

But today there was just one.  All by itself by the water’s edge, where no one but the ducks, Canada geese, and the few passing sailors from the yacht club will ever see it.

I have been walking the same path out to the end of the peanut for years and years — and could have kept walking it for years and years more, and never would I have seen this gorgeous rose, had I not been searching for this magnificent shorebird.

Thanks, egret. You made my day.

© BCP 2010