Tag Archives: Herons

Black-crowned night heron catches a fish

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘For the Birds.’ See more offerings here.

Bird baths and bird feeders are a couple of subjects for this theme and these photos are of what is, in effect, a bird feeder. It’s a fish pond at Hualalai Resort and where there’s a fish pond, there will likely be herons. I saw half a dozen perched around one of the ponds there, but this adult black-crowned night heron was the only one I saw catch anything.

It lunged its beak into the water and pulled this good-sized fish out onto the bank. After a few minutes of tossing the fish around to get it lined up properly, the bird swallowed it whole. The photo at right shows the fish on its way down.

Herons and ripples

Yesterday, I posted (here) a response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme of ‘Yin-Yang.’ (See more responses here.)

This is my second offering on the theme, which also features light and dark, but also stillness and movement – the stillness of the herons (there’s a second one in the background) and the movement of the rippling water. I like how the second set of ripples disturbs the first set and the reflections of the palm trees.

Black-crowned night heron

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Birthdays.’ See more offerings here. I don’t really have anything birthday-related so I’ve plumped for a photo taken on my birthday this year.

This is an adult black-crowned night heron at Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park, just north of Kailua Kona. I watched it for a while, as it moved around the edges of the Aimakapa Fishpond. In the top photo, the heron is coming in to land, and in the bottom photo, it’s taking off again.

The photo to the right shows the bird perched on a float. This was a good shot for my birthday since, with its large beak and somewhat puzzled expression, the heron looks a lot like me!

For more information about Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park, go to https://www.nps.gov/kaho/index.htm or bigislandhikes.com/kaloko-honokohau-park/.

Black-crowned night heron

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Stillness.’ (See more offerings here.) It made me think of this scene.

I was out early one morning and stopped by the port at Kawaihae. There wasn’t much going on, but I was happy to see this adult black-crowned night heron perched on a rock in the shallows. It didn’t seem to be actively fishing.

Indeed, the heron remained mostly still. It was just dark enough for the lights of the port to illuminate the rippled waters inside the harbor. The port itself was also quiet. No boats moving, no trucks lining up, no machinery grinding. Just a couple of men fishing off the small boat dock.

Adult black-crowned night heron

Black crowned Night Heron on old tree

Black crowned Night HeronAnother response to the last edition of the WordPress photo challenge with a theme of ‘All time favorites.’

I’ve run photos of black-crowned night herons a few times before, notably here and here. Both those posts could qualify as favorites, but they showed juvenile herons and one feature of the juveniles is that they don’t have a black crown.

These photos are of an adult bird and make it fairly obvious why they have their name. Another feature of this breeding adult is the long white head plume. And finally, all I can say about the bottom photo is, “I love what you’ve done with your hair.”

Black-crowned Night Heron with fuzzy head

A black-crowned night heron snaffles a tilapia

This juvenile black-crowned night heron swooped down and snatched a large tilapia out of a pond in front of a house by the coast. Trouble is, the fish was a bit big and the heron struggled to swallow it. After working on it by the pond, the bird flew to the top of a tree where a strong wind added to its difficulties. It hopped over to a taller tree, which only made things worse, before setting down on the rocky shore nearby.

I saw the bird a few minutes later without the fish, but don’t know whether it finally managed to swallow it or gave up and ejected it. Either way it wasn’t a good day for the fish.

Posted in response to this week’s WordPress Photo Challenge, ‘Out of This World.’