The Great Blue Heron, is a slender and elegant water bird with a lavender hue and a long pointed beak, and makes its nest in the tops of dead trees in wetlands.

Recently, there have between 40 and 50 active great blue heron nests in a rookery at Carter Fields, an 85-acre parcel of land with a huge beaver pond in North Andover at the Boxford line.  This year, it looks like we’ll have maybe active 10 nests. The land is owned by the Essex County Greenbelt Association, a nonprofit organization that owns thousands of acres in Essex County for the purpose of preserving natural habitats, the county’s agricultural heritage and scenic landscapes.

Herons typically do not migrate far. Adults will return to their previous nests, fix them up and reuse them to raise a new brood. The females lay between three and seven eggs in late March or early April, and the chicks hatch by May.