On Stuart Island I watched a Great Blue Heron fly up to the dock where I was
sitting. It hopped from the dock onto a partially submerged cable which
holds the dock on place, making a wobbly perch at best. With some rocking
back and forth the bird several times leaned over to hunt, lost balance,
flapped awkwardly back into upright. It did this for about 10 minutes, a
couple times even having to fly out of falling face first into the water.
Finally, it nabbed one of the fish I call dock perch, which are sea perch
that live under docks. It was a very large fish and I was astonished and
could not imagine how the heron was going to swallow it. It did not. It
flew up and dropped it on the dock, gave it 3-4 stabs with the beak, then
lifted it up by the tail and body slammed it against the dock. All these
little things spilled out of the fish, which the heron ate, bobbing its head
frantically as to not miss any. I finally figured out they were baby fish!
Apparently this spp of perch gives live birth, and the heron apparently
either knew this or got a nice surprise. All in all, I was left impressed
that this bird figured out how to catch something in deep water, and how to
extract the babies. I talked with a local resident who had seen the same
thing the last two years, in fact she was quite sure it was the same heron
as last year who did the same thing. It left me wondering how does a bird
figure this kind of stuff out? Does it observe and plan, or just experience
and react and remember? The dock perch would be quite out of reach from any
angle except the cable, and it was obviously a struggle to hunt from the
cable and the heron stuck with it. Hmmmmmmm.

Rob Sandelin
South Snohomish County at the headwaters of Ricci Creek
Sky Valley Environments <http://www.nonprofitpages.com/nica/SVE.htm>
Field skills training for student naturalists
Floriferous at msn.com



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