Please see below (after the transcript and show notes) for links to news and upcoming events.
TRANSCRIPT
From the Cumberland Gap to the Atlantic Ocean, this is
Virginia Water Radio for the week of September 10, 2012.
This week we feature another mystery sound. Have a listen
for about 20 seconds, and see if you can guess what’s making these squawks,
squeaks, and cackles. And here’s a hint:
The landscape is probably green if
you’re hear-on these sounds in
Virginia.
SOUND.
If you guessed a
Green Heron, you’re right! Green Herons
are common summer residents in all kinds of freshwater and marine habitats throughout
Virginia and much of the United States. They’re
rarely seen in Virginia during the winter, which they spend along the southern
U.S. coasts and in Central and South America.
Green Herons are one of the smallest herons found in North America;
they’re only about one-third as tall as the continent’s largest heron, the
Great Blue. They can make a variety of sounds
for different situations, including
raising an alarm, advertising for a mate, or defending a nest. The birds are predators on fish, frogs, and
other aquatic animals, and they’re remarkable for their practice of dropping
leaves, live insects, or other materials onto the water surface as lures for
their prey. Thanks to Lang Elliott for permission to use this week’s sound.
For other water sounds and music, and for more Virginia
water information, visit our Web site at virginiawaterradio.org,
or call us at (540) 231-5463. From the
Virginia Water Resources Research Center in Blacksburg, I’m Alan Raflo,
thanking you for listening, and wishing you health, wisdom, and good water.
SHOW NOTES
Green Heron photo by Gary Kramer,
made available for public use the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National
Digital Library, online at http://digitalmedia.fws.gov, accessed 9-10-12.
Acknowledgments: The sounds of the Green Heron were taken from the Stokes Field Guide to Bird Songs-Eastern Region CD set, by Lang Elliott with Donald and Lillian Stokes (Time Warner Audio Books, copyright 1997), used with permission of Lang Elliott, whose work is available online at http://www.langelliott.com/ and the “Music of Nature” Web site, http://www.musicofnature.org/ (as of 9/10/12). Sounds of Green Herons were used previously as part of a longer Virginia Water Radio episode (#48, week of January 10, 2011).
Sources and More
Information: The scientific name of Green Heron is Butorides virescens. Information
on Green Herons was taken from the
Wildlife Information Database maintained by the Virginia Department of Game and
Inland Fisheries, online at http://vafwis.org/fwis/?Title=VaFWIS+Species+Information (as of 7/9/12); A Guide to Field Identification of Birds of
North America, by Chandler S. Robbins et
al. (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001); and the Cornell University Lab of Ornithology’s “Bird Guide” Web site at http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search, and the Cornell lab’s “Birds of North
America Online” at http://bna.birds.cornell.edu/bna. Both
Cornell sites include photos, distribution maps, recordings of calls, and
ecological information on birds throughout the Western Hemisphere; a
subscription is required to use the “Birds of North America Online” site.
For more information about birds or
bird-watching in Virginia, visit the Web site of the Virginia Society of
Ornithology at www.virginiabirds.net;
or the “Wildlife Information” Web page of the Virginia Department of Game and
Inland Fisheries, at http://www.dgif.virginia.gov/wildlife/,
which includes the March 2010 “Official List of Native and Naturalized Fauna of
Virginia” (as of 9/10/12).
Recent Virginia Water
News
For
news relevant to Virginia's water resources, please visit the Virginia Water Central News Grouper,
available online at http://vawatercentralnewsgrouper.wordpress.com/.
Water Meetings and
Other Events
For
events related to Virginia's water resources, please visit the Quick Guide to Virginia Water–related
Conferences, Workshops, and Other Events, online at http://virginiawaterevents.wordpress.com/. The site includes a list of Virginia
government policy and regulatory meetings occurring in the coming week.
