Golden Gate Park has been having a moment, at least among the people who track what's in it. This past week a loose community of birders, dog-walkers, and dedicated park-goers swapped sightings across social media — a coyote near the buffalo paddock, a red-tailed hawk working the meadow behind Spreckels Lake, the usual great egrets in their usual spots, and at least one report of a peregrine falcon on the windmill. The park's western half, the part that most Muni riders never reach, holds a different scale of quiet than the eastern end near the Panhandle.

The wildlife doesn't seem to mind the people, and increasingly the people seem to be paying closer attention back. Run clubs cut through before sunrise and sometimes stop. The subreddit thread that kicked off this week's conversation drew hundreds of upvotes and a comment section that, true to form, pivoted quickly into a separate argument about bathroom closures and overnight park access — a real and ongoing dispute about how the park's facilities are managed after dark that has nothing to do with herons and everything to do with how the park functions as shared infrastructure.

Both things can be true at once: the bathrooms near the boathouse have been a point of genuine frustration for daytime visitors who find them locked, and also, a black-crowned night heron is hunting in the reeds at the edge of the lake at dusk most evenings.

Anyone walking the path around Stow Lake tomorrow morning will find it worth looking at the water before checking their phone. The heron, or one like it, is probably still there.