A Visit to a Heronry

Heronry

by Barbara Herkert; illus. by Gordy Wright

40 pages; ages 4-8

Tilbury House Publishers, 2026

themes: birds, animal families, conservation 

Spring dawns at the heronry. 

The first bird arrives.

He lights with large, graceful wings, long stilt-like legs.

Page by page Barbara Herkert introduces us to a heron family, from the first sticks of nest-building through raising chicks to fledglings leaving the nest. The combination of lyrical prose and luscious art make this a wonderful nature narrative for reading to children. Aside from the hungry eagle, the story feels peaceful and nurturing. 

What I like about this book: I like the layered text. One side of each spread features lyrical text in larger print. A text box on the other side contains additional supportive information – perfect for an older kid to read, or from which a parent could choose a fun fact of the day to highlight during a read-aloud. The life-cycle of a heron provides a nice arc for the book, and Gordy Wright’s illustrations provide details that will have kids lingering over the page. Plus there is back matter for curious naturalists of any age, and end pages that will have you dreaming of flight- or at least heron-watching. 

Beyond the Books:

Learn more about Great Blue Herons. Here’s a video from Cornell Lab of Ornithology that shows herons fishing, and here’s their heron page at All About Birds.

Watch a baby heron hatch! Video courtesy of Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

How do you compare to a Great Blue Heron? Herons range from 38-54 inches. How tall are you? Their wingspan stretches from 66-79 inches. How wide is your “wingspan” when you stretch both arms out to the side? 

Do you eat like a heron? Great Blue Herons eat mostly fish! But they also eat frogs, crabs, snakes, grasshoppers and other insects. What’s on your dinner plate?

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copies provided by the publishers.

Explore Outdoors ~ Finding our Colors

One of the things on my list of Things To Do in Fall (posted last week) is to watch the maple trees turn red. Or gold...  So that's what I've been doing this past week and I've noticed something. For sure, there's a "peak season" when most of the leaves will be at their most brilliant, but there's a long period of time when just a few are closing down their chlorophyll factories and putting on their fall colors. 

 

Watching them slowly change as the earth turns towards winter reminds me that we all change in our own time. Some of us, like the trees around me, are the first to turn red, orange, gold. Some of us are stragglers, the last ones to paint our leaves and join the party. And in the end, it doesn't matter because we all get there.

 

How are the leaves changing where you live?

 

Sharks in Kansas?

Sharks in Kansas: The Ancient Sea in the Middle of America

by Melissa Stewart; illus. by Becca Stadtlander 

40 pages; ages 4-8

‎Random House Studio, 2026

themes: sharks, prehistoric ocean, nonfiction

Sharks in Kansas? Seems impossible, right? After all, Kansas is smack-dab in the middle of the United States – more than 1,000 miles from the closest ocean…

… and when we think of Kansas we imagine waving fields of wheat, not ocean waves! But here’s the thing: our world hasn’t always looked the way it does now. And Melissa Stewart takes us back in time to 85 million years ago to show us what scientists imagine Kansas looked like, and some of the amazing creatures that lived there. Back then, it was part of a vast interior seaway, with dinosaurs roaming the shores and sharks swimming the deep waters. Many kinds of sharks including the Cretoxyrhina which grew to 26 feet long! (That’s like five of me lined up head to toe!)

What I like about this book:  I love the diversity of sea life that Melissa introduces, with quick facts in sidebars. Not only does she tell what they are, their size, and where they sit on the food chain, she provides a pronunciation guide for each creature. That 26-foot-long shark, for example: kruh-tox-ee-RIE-nuh. Through words and illustrations we see the inland seaway shrink until all that’s left are chalky bluffs filled with coccolithophores and fertile soil beneath which the SHARKS lie! Back matter tells more about the geological changes over time.

Beyond the Books:

What did your state look like 90 million years ago? Check out the ancient earth globe.

Try one of the shark crafts listed at https://craftprojectideas.com/now-trending/shark-week/. I like the “feed the shark” activity myself.

Watch the sharks at the Georgia Aquarium via their “shark-cam”.

How long is a shark? Use chalk to draw a line 26 feet long on a sidewalk (or use a clothesline on a lawn). Have you and your friends lie down end-to-end ... how many of you does it take to make one giant prehistoric shark?

Melissa writes tons of books about science and is a member of the STEAM Team Books group. You can find out more about her at her books at her website https://melissa-stewart.com. You can find more about recently released STEM and STEAM books at www.steamteambooks.com

Today we’re joining Perfect Picture Book Friday. It’s a wonderful gathering where bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's website. Review copy provided by Blue Slip Media, who graciously shares publisher’s copies with reviewers like me.