Photo by Steve Perrin

The following was written by Steve Perrin, a long-time observer of one of Maine’s largest great blue heron colonies…

Great blue herons maintained a heronry on 30-acre Burying Island in Taunton Bay, Maine, from roughly 1959 to 1999. Every year they’d follow the frost line up the coast, arriving on or about the first of April. Pairs would mate on the outer branches of red and white spruce trees shortly thereafter, build and refurbish nests, and incubate typically five eggs in each nest. Juveniles fledged in mid-August. Much of the colony stayed on the bay until the shoreline began to freeze in late December. Then they’d fly to warmer climes, I never knew where.

I was privileged to live from June 1986 through December 1988 in a one-room cabin I’d built on the island. Three families owned the island in undivided shares, and granted a conservation easement to the MDIFW in 1984. The heronry was in the 15-acre parcel designated a forever-wild sanctuary. Living close by, I had ample opportunity to observe the herons flying, feeding, nesting, loafing, and dealing with hungry bald eagles, classified as fish eagles, but having an acquired taste for herons and ducks.

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