Risky Business
A Great Blue Heron takes off with an armored catfish across Horsepen Bayou in morning fog. The invasive tropical fish, in a catatonic state from the recent freeze, was easy pickings but potentially deadly to the bird with its barbed fins. Possibly alert to the danger, the bird did not attempt to swallow the fish but rather manipulated it over and over with its beak before flying out of sight. When I encountered what I believe was the same bird some time later, it was neither dead nor still in possession of the intact fish. Eaten? Abandoned? A bayou mystery.
Risky Business
A Great Blue Heron takes off with an armored catfish across Horsepen Bayou in morning fog. The invasive tropical fish, in a catatonic state from the recent freeze, was easy pickings but potentially deadly to the bird with its barbed fins. Possibly alert to the danger, the bird did not attempt to swallow the fish but rather manipulated it over and over with its beak before flying out of sight. When I encountered what I believe was the same bird some time later, it was neither dead nor still in possession of the intact fish. Eaten? Abandoned? A bayou mystery.