No sooner did I remark about the dearth of Herons in my last post that I started seeing ’em all over the place. So, to make up for that, this will be a bit of a Great Blue Heron special.

I’ve noticed that they often drag their feet in the water to scrub off speed prior to landing:

then hop up a bit:

(Um, yeah, that’s what I’m really doing when it looks like I bounced the airplane on the runway.) Despite assertions by some to the contrary, I do believe birds can, and do, stall their wings. They just do it with very tight control and exactly when they want to, like these Herons making what human fliers would call a full-stall landing:



All that flying requires regular airframe maintenance:

Oh, yeah, the Osprey are still working their nest on top of the intake. I didn’t see any little ones this time, but this parent is obviously protective of someone: