Sonja

Well, fresh nuptial dress feathers of full strut got a hint of shimmering iridiscence on the blue-grey extras all over the warm brown hues. In the right light it can make an impression like copper in the process of oxidating.

I have seen late spring purple herons at the Fertoed, always in flight but from an overlook tower high above. Purple is perhaps not exact enough for a designer today used to describe colour schemes -- but to a simple fisherman and reed farmer in the times before anilin-stained cheap fabrics who would know purple mostly from the native columbines and rampions and some dark birds and berries with a shimmer....