Posted on 03/16/2019 4:15:41 AM PDT by PJ-Comix
The Great Blue Heron has returned! After an absence of over a week, he has returned as you can see here. Since he will probably be hanging around here on and off I have decided to name him Herbie.
Does anybody out there have suggestions on what to look for as an indication that Herbie is about to catch a fish or some other prey? I am assuming that if this Blue Heron has is neck extended over the water, that would be a good indication that he is in hunting mode. I would love to get video of Herbie catching and gobbling down his meal.
We have a blue Heron at the golf course I work at...he comes and goes..
Frogs, snakes, mice....other similiar critters..
Have you ever seen it catch those critters?
Where are you located anyway? I love that little pond and the weather seems warm. Plus, what kind of fish are those, bass?
Herons like frogs too......
If it stays around...it’s eating. They will stray from pond to pond in search of.....
One of their favorite foods are gophers nd other rodents that hang out in the reeds on shore. And frogs...snakes... not just fish.
Saw one swallowing a mouse/rat; failed to see him catch it. Shocked as did not know they might eat the rodent critters, believing they feasted only on fish.
I’ve seen video of herons eating small iguanas. There are plenty of them here. I wonder if they eat larger iguanas. I would love to get a video of that.
Great Blue Herons are very adaptive in their hunting technique. It may be a little hard to catch him in the act as they usually just snap down, spear the fish with their bill and it’s gone, just like that. In broad daylight, I’ve seen them spread their wings out around their head to shade the water so as to see the fish better. Probably the oddest behavior I’ve seen is while feeding the fish by our local library. I was throwing bread in for the fish, and Big Blue came up and stood right beside me, getting the fish when they came up for the bread!
Oh, regarding the squirrels, they’re not known to be savvy street crossers........
We have blue and gray herons here at Lake of the Ozarks.
Right now, we’re seeing dozens of dead gizzard shad along the water’s edge.
The herons are scarfing them up !
So if I could capture that on video, it would be a big deal?
They also love expense Koi.
Herons are easy to watch eating fish if you have a koi/goldfish pond.
I have a large pond in the yard and watched a heron and catfish battle it out. The heron won eventually but not before the catfish stabbed him a few times.
Nice to watch but always keep your distance.
Years ago, a well intentioned teenager happened across a heron caught in fishing line. He decided to save the bird by working to remove it from its entrapped condition. While working to free the bird, it reacted with its primary defensive weapon, its beak. It stabbed the young man directly in the eye causing permanent blindness.
Watch from a distance, real life is not the Disney channel!
I don’t think it would be a BIG deal. It would be entirely cool though.
I thought I was the only one to have an over-the-top fear of birds but I read that Lucille Ball was that way about birds as well.
Depends on the size of the fish it catches.
I've watched for several minutes as a big fish simply wouldn't go down. The Blue Heron knew better, though, and did eventually down it. Herons also leave the lake and search for small lizards in low-lying bushes.
Hmmm... If the local herons develop more of a taste for iguanas, perhaps that could hold down the numbers here of that INVASIVE species.
My blue heron story.
We have herons who work the small creeks where I live and like many places country roads tend to follow the creeks where they can. I was riding my motorcycle along such a creek when the noise of the bike got him flying. For a few seconds it was glorious. His speed over the creek matched my speed on the road and his height put him pretty much the same as mine on the bike. We were maybe 15 yards apart. Then he gained altitude, swung out over the road and deposited a load of blue heron crap on me and the bike.
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