Feeding Herons

Do you know what starts to happen after your pond has been around for a few years, goldfish multiplying, getting larger?

It starts to get noticed. Sure, the water is pretty well hidden by trees, but when your diet is made up primarily of fish and frogs, you must develop an eye for these things. Unfortunately.

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The water in the pond is a bit murky right now as the plant population hasn't yet gotten to the size where it will start controlling the excess nutrients in the water, but I'm still able to see the fish swimming around.

Except, I've only seen the little ones (image from mid-March):

I thought that the bigger ones were just hiding, or deeper in the water. Now I know that at least some of them are gone, as I watched this great blue heron down one of the big orange ones yesterday.

Even though I checked to see if any fish were visible last evening (they were), I still woke up in a panic this morning, certain that the heron was out there clearing out even the small ones this morning.

It only flew off after I ran down there.

I suspect it's been back though, and that all of the big ones are gone. I suppose I'll have to install some netting over part of the pond, at least until the surface plants grow up a bit, providing more protection.

Just a second after swallowing the goldfish.

I know it's Nature, the cycle of life, but it still gets me a bit down. I should have done more.

I wonder if that's why the frogs are so nervous, jumping into the water while I'm still 40' (12m) away from them?

So the excitement of seeing such a large, beautiful bird in the yard was tempered by the loss of one of my "old friends".  Sigh.


All images in this post were captured with my video camera not my DSLR, hence the less-than-normal quality.

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