Sometimes birds don’t do what the bird books say they do. Case in point, this Yellow-crowned Night Heron, so named because it is mostly a nocturnal bird, was out and about in the daytime, foraging in the grassy dunes for sand crabs when we arrived at Bolivar Flats our first morning in Texas. A large bird, about two feet tall, it walked slowly and steadily forward along the edges of the dunes, stopping occasionally, and not at all concerned with our presence. Its progress was so steady and the bird seemed so focused that we were able to move ahead of it without disturbing its forward motion. It was a great introduction to Bolivar Flats. The long white feathers streaming from its crown show that it is in breeding plumage as well as its normally yellow legs turned pink, obviously not seen in this image.