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Herons


Frank
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Hi, I hope someone can answer my query. Is it normal for herons to stay on the ground in open terrain???  I ask as I have seen upto 4 herons over the last week, everyday in the same place, dodging the huge buzzards, one of which has been stalked by upto 3 buzzards etc.  My friend has telephoned the local bird rescue centre and she got the equivalent of a french shrug down the phone! There is one that doesn't seem to be able to fly far, but the othres are close by. Will they just scoot off when good and ready or are they waiting to retire the great bird garden in the sky?? Many thanks for any advice. I live in the Gemozac area of dept 17

Kimberly

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It's quite normal for Herons to be in fields and open land, Kimberly, it's where they mainly go at this time of year and right through winter until the breeding urge grabs them in the spring. They will often stay in the same small area for days, weeks or even months, where they just stand and wait for something tasty to hop or slide by on the ground, and then eat it. If there is water around they may alternate the field behaviour with a bit of fishing, they like a bit of frog.

The buzzards will not be bothering them, buzzards don't attack other birds and rarely take anything larger than a vole, unless it's already dead.

If you are really worried about one of them being injured, walk toward it and see if it moves, then when you get close, if it is injured, put it in a large cardboard box and contact the nearest Centre de Sauvegaurd by phone and ask for instructions as to what to do.

You will find more information on my web site (below) and if you wish you can call me, 0549876504 or Skype:  un_autre_monde

Chris

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Hi Kimberly and Chris, we have a similar situation near here. Alondside the Canal du Midi there is a heronery (?) and last winter there were 17 herons in the field by it. There is also an egret in among them sometimes. It really is a lovely site. They also go to a small river that runs under the canal where there is a small pool, full of fish, and we have quite often seen a little egret there too. Very popular with us!

They are such graceful birds.

The other day we had a firecrest fly, gently, into our kitchen window. It was OK and it got it's senses back by perching in the ivy around the window. So we had the close up of the tiny thing for about 10 minutes. It's the first one I have seen, how do they survive? I know the answer to that one, quite often they don't. Sorry Chris, I couldn't get a photo of it because of the direction of the light. I was very disapointed. Sorry Kimberly, hyjack of your thread over...

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When we first saw the herons in fields we thought someone had put a plastic one as a joke, or as in the UK, to scare off real herons near fish ponds.  However, they are real and tend to go back to the exact same place every time.  One distressing thing we saw yesterday was a 'murder' of crows, about 20 of them, attacking a sparrowhawk.  We think it did manage to get away but they were very viscious with it.  They also attack the nest of buzzards nearby, whereas you would think a buzzard was big enough to look out for itself, they seem to have a pretty hard time from the crows.  Now I know why they are called a 'murder'.
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I would think that a sparrow hawk will out run and out fly crows and if you think about it they are only looking after their own. As for the buzzard, it is not as quick as the crows and they can give it a hard time. Mind you as far as I know there are some buzzards that will catch crows if they are attacked, after all they are meat and don't take a lot of looking for!

We used to watch the crows and the buzzards over our house in England. The crows had to be very carefull as to how they approached if they didn't want to get whacked by the buzzards tallons. The crows always won and chased the buzzards away. They will take young birds and the crows don't like it...

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[quote user="chris pp"]

The buzzards will not be bothering them, buzzards don't attack other birds and rarely take anything larger than a vole, unless it's already dead.

Chris

[/quote]

Chris, surely they will take rabbit too? One of the displays at the Newent Falconary Center used to be a volounteer from the crowd, usually young, would drag a rabbit skin lure across the grass and the buzzard dived on it as they would in the wild.

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We placed a dead rat on a buzzards perch and it really struggled to fly off with it, so it just flew a short distance and didnt gain much height and then stopped to eat it in the adjacent field. As I understand it, the Buzzards are quite lightweight around 3 kg so would imagine they would struggle with a rabbit.  Lovely to watch though!
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Well thank you all for putting my mind at rest.  We have lots of buzzards up here in Manche and I really love watching them circling over our property and riding the thermals.  However, our poor old cat is getting on a bit now and I've started thinking about the day we may think about getting a kitten.  At first I felt we were in a much better position than we ever had been in the UK with our young cats - no main roads close by, but I had worried about the size of a kitten and swooping buzzards.  What about the sparrow hawks or barn owls?
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 What about the sparrow hawks or barn owls?

Well, what about them? If it's your future kitten that you are concerned about, don't be. Neither Barn Owls or Sparrow hawks will attack your kitten. Sparrow hawks mainly take small birds, bluetits, finches, that type of thing (which is why it's good to have a bird table, fattens them up). Barn Owls eat mainly voles and a few other rodents.

I'd be more concerned about humans.

Chris

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