Ardea herodias, North America's largest heron

WoodenBoat editor Matt Murphy recently posted the following guest blog featuring this heron seen while working on the Mistral hatch.

"For nearly 30 days now the Pacific Northwest has faced one of the key features of living on the lee shore of the Pacific Ocean: rain. Often, the region's reputation for wet weather is misplaced; in the warmer half of the year, the climate is downright Mediterranean. But the winter rain gets even, with storm pulses coming in daily. Puddles are growing puddles. The ground is a gumbo, sliding off hillsides and dissolving trees of their moorings. On the waterfront, boat covers and spring lines are growing green with moss. Sailors, facing the eternal choice -- sail or work on the boat -- are defaulting indoors to refinish oars or strip varnish from a hatch. The stove in the work shop at Seattle's Center for Wooden Boats is on a steady diet of scraps. Foot traffic on the docks is so light that the resident heron sits for hours unfazed, using the pilot gig DAN as a perch. With so much water, boats and shore birds are all the more in their element."