Birding Adventures of Dave DeReamus: Penn's Grant Path and a Black-crowned Night-Heron! ~ July 23, 2026

Thursday, July 23, 2026

Penn's Grant Path and a Black-crowned Night-Heron! ~ July 23, 2026

I decided to walk a path I'd never been on before in one of my Breeding Bird Atlas blocks. The Penn's Grant Path branches off of the Palmer Bikeway north of Stocker Mill Road. I parked at the end of Corriere Drive and walked the trail from that end. Notables among the 30 species included Hairy Woodpecker, Northern Flicker, Eastern Wood-Pewee, Red-eyed Vireo, Wood Thrush, American Goldfinch, Baltmore and Orchard Oriole, and Rose-breasted Grosbeak.

Hairy Woodpecker

A young Blue Jay.

Orchard Oriole

I checked out Green Pond by slowly driving along the closed-off section of the road along its east side. The water level is the lowest I've ever seen it in my 50+ years of birding. There was an obvious Great Egret at the back edge of the pond along with some Killdeer. Two Green Herons, a Great Blue Heron, and 11 continuing Snow Geese were also seen along its edge. I was turning around at the northeast corner of the pond when I noticed a Cliff Swallow flying over it. When I got out of the car to try and get a photo of it, I was surprised to find a Black-crowned Night-Heron close by underneath one of the overhanging willows. I took these two photos of it, backed off, and then sent out a text about it to other birders.

Black-crowned Night-Heron

I left the bird there, drove over to the paved path and walked it to the back middle pond, which is the only one of the three retention ponds that still has water in it. There, I found 4 Spotted Sandpipers and one Least Sandpiper while a pair of Red-tailed Hawks circled overhead. Birds along the path included an Eastern Kingbird, a Northern House Wren, a pair of American Goldfinches, and and a young Gray Catbird.

A young Gray Catbird.

I went back over to the pond and the Night-Heron was still there, but this time it had grabbed a frog, which was so big that it was having trouble swallowing it. I snapped this sequence of photos during the 15 minutes that it took for it to reposition the frog and swallow it head first.