Yeah, me too! I'd been worried about where they were going to release it.
This individual, we think, is one we've seen so often, for years now-- it (the wildlife people confirmed there's no sexual dimorphism in blue herons, not notably anyway, so it's impossible to know just by looking at this guy if it's male or female; my sister was using they/them pronouns for it but I've found that's confusing when you're talking about an animal, somehow) stalks frogs all along the hillside behind the house and up into the pastures, including where M found it. So it's kind of an old friend; sometimes it would come quite close to the house in its quest for froggy sustenance, and we'd gather around the kitchen window and peer at it until it finished its hunt and lumbered away on its enormous wings. So we'd be awfully sad to lose it, either to mishap or to it being released somewhere else. (I mean, obviously this individual guy's got a fairly big range, and probably goes to one or more of the area's lakes too; it surely didn't pick up a fishing hook up in the farm's little pond, which doesn't have any fish. If it were released elsewhere it could probably find its way back here; it likely migrates as far as North Carolina in the winters, so. But still!)
I'm a fan of frogs, but I can spare a few for this guy, especially given what a bumper year it is for frogs. I'm almost positive this heron's our regular, and we're glad for M's quick thinking in putting it into the bucket when it was too weak to fly away. There's all kinds of critters around here that would gladly do for an incapacitated large bird.
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This individual, we think, is one we've seen so often, for years now-- it (the wildlife people confirmed there's no sexual dimorphism in blue herons, not notably anyway, so it's impossible to know just by looking at this guy if it's male or female; my sister was using they/them pronouns for it but I've found that's confusing when you're talking about an animal, somehow) stalks frogs all along the hillside behind the house and up into the pastures, including where M found it. So it's kind of an old friend; sometimes it would come quite close to the house in its quest for froggy sustenance, and we'd gather around the kitchen window and peer at it until it finished its hunt and lumbered away on its enormous wings.
So we'd be awfully sad to lose it, either to mishap or to it being released somewhere else.
(I mean, obviously this individual guy's got a fairly big range, and probably goes to one or more of the area's lakes too; it surely didn't pick up a fishing hook up in the farm's little pond, which doesn't have any fish. If it were released elsewhere it could probably find its way back here; it likely migrates as far as North Carolina in the winters, so. But still!)
I'm a fan of frogs, but I can spare a few for this guy, especially given what a bumper year it is for frogs. I'm almost positive this heron's our regular, and we're glad for M's quick thinking in putting it into the bucket when it was too weak to fly away. There's all kinds of critters around here that would gladly do for an incapacitated large bird.