The Herring Gull is a common gull with a light gray wings and back. It has white spots on its black wing tips. It has a yellow bill with two red spots on each side of the lower mandible. Their main habitats are lakes, rivers, estuaries, and beaches. They are common in aquatic habitats and not to mention McDonald's parking lots.

Mute Swans are 48- 60". Adult Mute Swans are all white.Their bills are orange with a black lumps at the base. The Mute Swan doesn't make a lot of noise.The only sounds it makes are hissing and grunting sounds. The Mute Swan lives in ponds, rivers, coastal lagoons, and marshes. 

Over the past years, people have been working to help the osprey. Still, more people have been born and just as many waste products have been dumped. Do you think the almost wiped out osprey will make a comeback? Well, they have. Compared to 25 years ago, ospreys are thriving. Many people have heard and granted the pleas for ospreys. People are trying to do the same for other animals in the salt marsh. Let's hope they succeed and go on to wildlife beyond the marshes.

At one time this bird was hunted almost to extinction for their ornate plumes on their head and backs. Now we have laws protecting these birds. This bird has black legs and yellow feet.

The Great Blue Heron is a large common bird that's mainly gray with a yellowish or pale bill. It is often mistaken with the Sandhill Crane, but it flies with its neck folded, not extended like a crane's. Its call is just a loud squawk. It lives in most lakes, ponds, rivers, and marshes.

The Laughing Gull is a slender medium sized gull which has a black hood in breeding plumage. In summer the adults back and wings are dark gray and the trailing edge of the wing is white and the wing tip is black.

The Common Tern is white with a black cap and gray wings and back. Its bill is red with a black tip and its tail is deeply forked. Its call is a kip-kip-kip or a tee-aar. It lives in lakes, ponds, rivers, coastal beaches, and islands.

The Canada Goose lives all over the United States except California and parts of Alaska. Its habitat is in marshes, lakes, ponds, fields, marshes, and lawns. They are about 22-45". Some of them are twice as big as a duck. They have a brownish body with a black head and a long neck with white cheeks.

The male mallard has a green head, white neck ring, purple breasts and neck, with a gray wings and body. The female is speckled brown with an orange bill. The mallard lives in almost everywhere in America. Its habitat is in lakes and marshes.

The males use their songs to proclaim their territory. While singing, they thrust out their brightly colored red epaulets. Most of these birds migrate south with cold weather, although they are among the last to leave this area and often the first to return in the spring.

Click here to see a movie of this bird. It runs really fast and has an interesting call.