Photo of the Week: Least Bittern

A small black, brown, and white heron hunches over wet rocks along the shoreline as it hunts for fish. The bird has long yellow-green legs and bright yellow eye. In the background is the clear blue water of Lake Erie.

An unexpected find for this late in the year, the Least Bittern continues to delight southeast Michigan birders as it hunts for food along the Lake Erie shoreline.

I’ve seen Least Bitterns before, a small black and brown heron with long yellow legs and toes and what looks like white racing stripes on its body.

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Photo of the Week: A Morning for Cliff Swallows

A small brown bird with outstretched wings, short square tail, buffy-orange rump, and white head patch pauses over dried brown mud nests in a corner of a gray concrete portion of a street bridge.

As a birder, sometimes you need to remind yourself to look at things other than trees, bushes, yards, and fields to see birds.

Like bridges—this one is over the Huron River at Gallup Park in Ann Arbor, Michigan—where you see Cliff Swallow nests as you look up from the trail.

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