I too look forward to any insight others may have on the cause of this
behavior, but I would also like to learn from the observer the basis for
attributing gender to the two birds, other than the original assumption
that this was [very out of season] mating behavior.

chris kessler
seattle

Guttman, Burt wrote:

> This was passed on to me, and it's so weird that I felt I must send it
> on to Tweeters for comments and a possible explanation. East Bay
> Drive is the street running along one side of our local inlet of Puget
> Sound.
>
> Burt Guttman
> The Evergreen State College
> Olympia, WA 98505 guttmanb at evergreen.edu
> <mailto:guttmanb at evergreen.edu>
> Home: 7334 Holmes Island Road S. E., Olympia, 98503
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -----Original Message-----
> From: envirotalk at yahoogroups.com [mailto:envirotalk at yahoogroups.com] On
> Behalf Of Peggy Bruton
> Sent: Tuesday, September 13, 2005 10:24 PM
> To: envirotalk at yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [envirotalk] murder on East Bay Drive
>
> Hi folks:
>
> I witnessed a murder today. The perpetrator just strolled away after it
> was done.
>
> Here's what we saw from our deck, around 10 this morning. We were
> watching fish leaping, seals playing, families of mergansers swimming
> by, and a great blue heron roosting on our little sailboat resting at
> low tide on the intertidal mud. Nice peaceful tableau. Then there's a
> big cacophonous squawking on the mud a bit to the south, and it seems
> the heron has moved down there to land on top of another heron, the
> latter obviously displeased. Hmmm, we thought, a heron mating in
> progress. Top heron nips at the neck of lower heron, clearly
> recognizable mating behavior.
>
> But something doesn't seem right. The squawking goes on and the biting
> looks like something other than foreplay. Vicious, until lower heron is
> lying splayed in the mud, struggling to get up. But top heron is not
> having any of it, keeps up the neck biting until the victim is lying
> quite still. We're still rooting for her to get up and get washed and
> fly off when the killer begins stabbing -- multiple ferocious thrusts of
> the beak to the head, presumably the eye, of the victim. That's the coup
> de grace. Apparently to make sure he's done, he grabs the middle of her
> neck -- by then as limp as well-done spaghetti -- in his beak and lifts
> it up so her dead head hangs straight down, making an acute angle from
> his grip. Then he drops it and strolls calmly off into the shallows
> where a flock of mallards are dabbling about.
>
> I have never before seen LIVE any animal, human or otherwise, dispatch a
> conspecific. Yet I know many do; Jane Goodall documented war among the
> great apes she studied, and of course there are battles to the death
> between dominant males and contenders for that rank within many
> communities of large mammals. Still, I found this scene unsettling. So
> entirely unprovoked. Was it indeed just a courtship gone sour? Would a
> female's rejection really evoke lethal violence from a suitor?
>
> Who has a guess? I have no idea what was going on or why, and the perp
> will never talk. I hope one of you veteran wildlife observers or
> students of bird behavior might have some inklings you can share.
>
> Peace,
>
> pb
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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