‘Tis the season to spot tall wader birds at our local Toledo Metroparks
MAUMEE – If it seems like you’re seeing many more great egrets and great blue herons than usual these days, you’re right.
Late summer and fall are perfect for viewing the tall waders, especially in Howard Marsh Metropark, and in the Maumee River rapids and shallows from Side Cut Metropark upriver to Providence Metropark and beyond.
The numbers of those two waders are at their peak now that the nesting adults have fledged their young, and both adults and young are now feeding in mainland marshes and streams. The young were raised in the largest American rookery on the Great Lakes, located just east of us on West Sister Island National Wildlife Refuge, Ohio’s only designated national wilderness.
When that rookery is active the adults can be seen regularly flying back and forth from the island to nearby marshes, such as Howard Marsh Metropark, Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge and Magee to catch food for their young and ferry it back to West Sister Island.
Look for them, especially at Side Cut Metropark in the channels at Blue Grass Island and the rapids below the Fallen Timbers Monument, across the river at Wood County Park District’s Buttonwood/ Betty C. Black Recreation Area, the Roche deBout Rapids at Farnsworth Metropark, Weirs Rapids Fishing Access in Wood County, and Wolf Rapids below the Providence Dam at Providence Metropark.
