Submitted by R. Neal on Wed, 2008/03/19 - 3:55pm
We were driving down the road towards the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge this morning and spotted this heron coming out of the canal along the side of the road. It had caught something, and was struggling to get airborne.
The heron flew out right in front of us, going down the road in the same direction. We had to slow down to keep from running over it. At first we thought it had a snake, but then we could see it looked like an eel. We followed the heron down the road for a minute, until it flew back over into the brush along the side of the road. We pulled over to watch. Click read more to see what happened...
Coming in for a landing with its cargo...
Hmm... now what?
OK, I think I can swallow this thing...
Oops, quite a predicament...
The eel almost gets a stranglehold...
Slurp...
Gulp... the heron prevails.
We didn't catch the whole struggle on film. It was hilarious to watch, though. The heron kept shaking the eel loose and throwing it on the ground and stabbing at it with his beak, until it finally got the eel in position to swallow it alive and whole. It happened so fast I didn't catch the coup de grâce except for the eel's tail disappearing.
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Wow! Nice catch. The
Wow! Nice catch. The pictures I mean.
Awesome. I wonder if the
Awesome. I wonder if the heron could fly straight after that meal with a wiggling eel for ballast.
Amphiuma
I can't make out the head but I'll bet the beast is one of these.
I've wrestled a few of them. They can bite, but usually don't. The really odd thing is that they eat snakes, frogs, and just about anything they can catch, including chicks and ducklings.
The food chain is really a circle.
Amazing. Thanks, yet again,
Amazing. Thanks, yet again, for wonderful nature photography.
Pam Strickland
"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." ~Kurt Vonnegut
Amazing...
photography and timing. thanks for sharing.
That is absolutely
That is absolutely amazing.
http://www.newscoma.wordpress.com
Great catch! I have a few
Great catch! I have a few heron's that live in the wetlands right below my condo, but I never see them feeding. What lens are you shooting this with?
This was taken with the
This was taken with the "walkabout" rig, my old D70 and a new Nikon 18-200 VR which does a pretty decent job considering the range it covers. The photos were cropped to zoom in more on the subject.
Thanks!
Hard to know which side to cheer for in that battle. That bird would have had one heck of a 'the one that got away' story to share with his buddies!
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