I get excited by the sight of majestic grey heron
HO HOW delightful it was to see a pictorial guide to the 100 most common British birds in Tuesday’s Telegraph – a proper old-school bonus for buying a newspaper.
Despite my surname, I’m not a particularly avid birdwatcher but my eye was drawn at once to No 16 on the RSPB poster: the grey heron.
This majestic creature has been the subject of much mirth from my sons over the years. “Ooh, Dad’s seen a heron!” they’ll giggle if ever I point one out on a countryside walk.
It’s true, I get quite excited by the sight of the grey variety that graces our waterways and wetlands. It’s partly its size: at up to a metre long, it is one of the largest birds in the British Isles. And it looks like the prehistoric pterodactyl’s upstart cousin. But what I find most striking is the contrast between its enormity and its mouse-like timidity. Imagine a 7ft-tall man mountain slinking out of a gathering of seven-stone weaklings, embarrassed by his stature, and you get some idea of what it’s like to happen upon a grey heron, statuesque at the edges of a canal. You freeze, wanting to take in the sight. You’re yards away and no possible threat to the creature. But disturb one twig, crunch one tiny pebble or dare reach for your phone in the hope of a photo and it will take flight, lumbering into the air like a giant airliner struggling to take off from a neighbourhood park.
It has no problem mixing with its own kind, though, as anyone who has seen a heronry will testify. There was a spectacular example on the lake at Nottingham’s Wollaton Park this year, with dozens of herons nesting in a single weeping willow.
I saw something I’d never seen before while holidaying in Whitby last month: a heron pouncing on a fish while standing stock-still at the edge of the River Esk.
That was nothing compared to the feat of a larger member of the grey’s family in New York. Video on the internet shows a great blue heron dunking a large rat in water before swallowing it whole. Birdwatchers in the US have also photographed a great blue swallowing a baby alligator and (think Alien!) an eel bursting out of the stomach of a heron that had clearly not been taught the importance of mastication.
If only a recent visitor to Straw’s Bridge, the little waterfowl paradise on the borders of Ilkeston and West Hallam, had been sharper on the draw, his footage would surely have gone viral. But by the time he’d activated his camera, a hungry grey had taken off with a rat in its beak – and the rat had fallen out in mid-air and scurried back to the bank.
I bet Ratty will be dining out on that for ages.
See the RSPB pullout in today’s Derby Telegraph for a guide to birds that can be found in your area.