Nemesis: noun, a long-standing rival; an archenemy.

Everyone has a nemesis of one kind or another. Whether it’s an archenemy, a project you just can’t seem to finish, or something you just can’t seem to get, no matter how many opportunities you have.

The latter is the truth for many birders. Each of us has that bird that shows up multiple times every year that we just miss or are never in the right place at the right time.

For me, one of those is the the Snowy Egret. A small white egret with yellow feet and a thin black bill with yellow at the base of it at the eye. It will show up in Michigan at least a couple times a year but with low enough frequency that it is considered rare for the state.

I have been out on many occasions with the hopes that I finally see one in the state and in each instance, I have come up empty. Last weekend I went out specifically because the crafty bird was seen just the day before. And while I did get to see some very good birds, I didn’t see this one.

While watching my son play a scrimmage baseball game this weekend an alert hit my phone….my nemesis had been seen! The Snowy Egret was found just a half an hour away and it took everything in my being to not run for the truck and peel out of there with smoke from the tires filling the ball field.

All during the 25-minute drive, I was trying to stay calm, hoping it would stick around but also knowing that a bird flies and it could be gone again. I pulled up to the pond on a country dirt road where I took a quick glance. There it was right along the road! Excitedly I grabbed for my camera and just as I was going to snap off a National Geogphic style picture, a car from the opposite direction scared it off a little farther away.

I ended up taking a couple of pictures for documentation, hoping for the best, and headed off, knowing my nemesis had been conquered.

Time to find my next one!!

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