The Great Egret Research Project

Brain cancer is...

 ...driven by the need to know.

We made it to the park early to walk this morning and caught this egret sitting in its usual spot in the lake. This is a typical sighting for "our" egrets.  They are always alone.

They never hang out with friends, the way that ducks and coots (yay!  two are back!) do:

Neither do they seem to hang out with partners, the way the geese do:

Finally, we have never seen an egret baby at the park, in contrast to our friends the geese.

Our knowledge of egrets is solely confined to our sample at Craig Park, so when Brenda sent us a picture of "her" egret--on the other coast--it confirmed what we what we knew:

Yet another solitary egret, making its lonely way through life.  So we thought!  But when our conversation with Brenda unfolded, we realized how very little we know about egrets.  Brenda says:

• Her egret is an expert lizard catcher.
• Egrets near them hang out in big flocks in the oak trees and in the marsh.
• The egret flocks include friendships with the wood storks.

 Our egret minds are blown!  Now we have nothing but egret questions:

• Are our egrets the same as Brenda's egrets?
• I think not. Brenda's egret has boring black feet whereas ours has striking yellow feet. But is that because hers is young?
• All egrets are herons, but are all herons egrets?  If not, how many species of each of are there?  And what's the difference?
• Why do they behave so differently, our egret and Brenda's egret?
• And why do our egrets behave so differently from the other bird species?
• What's typical for egrets and mating behavior?
• Where do they lay their nests?
• What do baby egrets look like?
• Shouldn't Brenda's egret's parents have taught it to (a) eat fish and (b) play nicely with other egrets?

Clearly brain cancer is way down on our list of concerns today.  Phew.

We'll keep you posted with our research.

We hope your major concerns today were similarly (un)weighty.