Stephen Barnard continues the saga of the bald eagle nest that was built in the middle of a great blue heron rookery. Apparently the eagle chicks have hatched, but haven’t been seen yet.
This is the male eagle guarding nest area, perched on an abandoned heron nest. These birds have sexually dimorphic behaviors. I haven’t seen the female off the nest in many weeks. She’s incubated eggs in some very cold weather. The male is active, fishing for the female and now for the eaglets, and when he’s not fishing (most of the time) he’s on guard for intruders. The herons have given up on the rookery. That’s sad, but life goes on. They’ve moved to build another rookery across a field, but they probably won’t have a good breeding season. Someday the eagle nest will blow down — it’s not sited well — and they’ll move and the herons will move back in, and I may live to see it.
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Very nice shot. Look at all those light feather edges!
Did he actively harass the herons and cause them to move, or was it more that his mere presence just made them too nervous to stay? I gather the latter.
He goes after them.
He’s just going to have to learn some manners if he wants to have neighbors.