About this time of year one of the local Herons will land next to my garden pond and lick his beak.

So far my anti-Heron wires seemed to have worked but I'd hate to lose any fish. I cleared out all the smaller fish last season and am left with a couple of dozen decent sized Koi, 22" plus.

So my question is - will a Heron try and injure, stab, a large fish that it knows it cannot carry away? dl

 

Possibly.
The missus was rounding up the chooks last week, and found a big fish in the woods at the bottom of the garden- about 12" without it's head- and a big hole where it's fishy bits should have been.
Something obviously couldn't be shagged to carry it any further. The nearest lake is about 1/4 mile away.
The chickens were loving it!

 

Am I alone in thinking this was a drug question?

I'm sure it said HEROIN in the title

 

David I have kept koi for many years, and although I have never (yet) lost a fish to a heron, I have heard many tales of people who have had fish of all sizes disappear, sometimes complete ponds emptied over a number of days.
I also know of one or two keepers who have had mesh screens of one kind or another placed over their ponds either for heron prevention or as a safety measure to prevent young children falling in. These people have both had instances of large koi being stabbed by herons through the mesh (wrought iron in one case). There was no chance of any fish being pulled through the covers in either case, but the birds don't see the problem they face.
Herons can't bite pieces off a fish as far as I know, but they will stab anything that takes their fancy, almost regardless of the size. Up to a point they appear to have no recognition of size/weight of a fish. It's all food and if they can't carry it they'll just turn on another one until they get what they want.
Steve

BTW it wasn't me that negged the post by SunnySideUp

 

If you can miss a fecking great tree stump with an axe you're hardly going to be able to read the small print are you?

Anyway Heroin is bad for you at your age.........

dl

 

Yeah, I was afraid someone was going to say that!! I am sure you are right and I wouldn't want to leave the house empty for a couple of days. We are always on the lookout and the dog will bark like mad and alerts us. As I say my trip/prevention wires are fairly good and, at this time of the year, most fish are snoozing on the pond floor which helps. It's quite a big pond so a mesh is a bit cumbersome. We did get one Heron which actually went into the main part of the pond itself, way out of its depth, which was a bit unusual. It struggled to take off when I asked it to leave.

How do you tell if a post is negged - I've always wondered? It's only Lewis getting bored I just ignore or send a sarcy message back. He is getting on a bit and his medication doesn't help

Thanks for input.

d

 

Aren't bird of prey statues meant to scare off herons.

Nope apparently you use a fake heron or aligator/snake but none are really very effective.

But they hate large dogs.

i did find this motion activated scarecrow that fires water at said target.

The Scarecrow - Motion-Activated Scarecrow for Predator Control for Garden Ponds

 

and size

 

Did you know alot of those koi's come in by aifreight from the far east?
we have a couple of importers as customers