For all of the years I have been coming to North Captiva and fishing around the grass flats on the east end of the airstrip, there has been a feathery long legged fixture patrolling the beach in search of his next meal. This bold great blue heron seems to have learned that fishermen can produce some easy pickings for dinner, so he come over near to anyone with a fishing pole in hand, and even better, a bait bucket in tow. More than once when I was catching pin fish for bait and putting them in a five gallon bucket with an aerator to keep them alive, I would turn around only to find that stealthy heron had snuck up and snitched one or two out of the bucket.
When I was much younger and my grandfather would take us on vacation to Cocoa Beach and we would fish from a sea wall there, mostly catching pin fish and catfish. Grandpa would get the biggest kick out of throwing a catfish over on the ground near a heron that used to wait on us there for handouts. Since catfish have spines that stick out on the sides and the top of their bodies, that heron would take a long time to figure out if he could in fact get a catfish down his gullet. Pecking to try to kill the fish, then picking it up and tossing it into his mouth, getting it part way down its throat and having the fish get stuck or flip around, and then out it would come. Peck, peck, flip, gulp, gulp, gag – repeat. In most cases, the heron would stick it out and eventually slide the fish down the hatch. It is amazing how large a fish a heron can get down that slender neck.
Since my permanent move to the island and more frequent visits to the beach along his turf, we see this bird almost every night we go fishing. I suppose it is possible that there have been a number of herons over the years that have worked that turf, but based on appearance and personality of this one bird, I suspect this particular heron has been here a long time. Since we were fishing almost every night, and we saw this heron each time, we decided to name him. Like naming children, when two people try to agree on a name, there can be some disagreement. Of course naming a heron does not have any guidelines. So cartoon like rhymey names are tempting for me – like “Sharon the Heron” or something like that was floated. Jason was having none of that. After some back and forth, Fisher was agreed upon since he was fishing all the time. OK, gimme a break ya’ll.
Anyway, one evening we were fishing and Jason caught a Spanish Mackerel which was about 15” long. Fisher was very interested as the fight ended, hoping that he might get a shot to have an easy meal. Of course a fish of this size is more than a mouthful for a bird of his size, so I thought he was he was out of his league. However, when Jason tossed the fish back into the water near the shore, Fisher decided he would have a go. He quickly pounced over and launched his spear like beak into the fish and picked him up flying him onto the beach a ways to evaluate the situation further. First there were a couple of strikes to try to disable the meal. Unfortunately his cousin white heron was nearby and was expressing some interest now. So Fisher picked him up and flew him further away behind the bushes near the beach house. We could barely see him now, but could see the struggle to decide what to do with the fish. A peck peck here, peck peck there, head turning to get a better look, a squawk or two, what to do?
Finally, he brought his meal back into plain view and began to get down to business. Jason and I figured there was no possible way for that fish to fit into his throat, so we watched to see how long before he gave up. To our amazement, the fish slid down and out of sight. Quite a bulging neck there Fisher… With a head shake and a fluff of the feathers, he puffed out his chest and winked at us as our mouths hung open (well it looked like he winked, maybe both eyes were closing in pain and I could only see one side of his head, who knows).
David