Herons out of place.

This black heron walks across the front of my house. They are always in a black water lagoon that is at the entrance of the urbanization where I live. I say black water because at first it was a natural lagoon with a lot of weeds, but then the intelligence of urban planning came and placed the drainage systems in this lagoon. The herons don’t mind apparently, they just stay in places where they can subsist.

This heron was in the gutter on my sidewalk, trying to eat something. I have to wonder: what is it doing here? Is there no food in the lagoon? There must be tadpoles and other kinds of animals there, or is it looking for human food remains?

In these drainage channels there is generally everything, people clean what remains of their pet food and then sweep it into the canals in front of their houses, then with water they make all that waste run through the canals. That must be what this heron is looking for.

I had seen them from afar in the lagoon, but never appreciated them so closely. They are less afraid of approaching humans. In the countryside, in the region where I live, these herons are usually in the lagoons and I could never get close to them. Always being approximately 100 meters from them, they felt scared and took flight, but this heron is as close to me as at a distance of about 2 meters.

The heron flew away because a car went by with so much noise in its escape that he got scared and flew. I figured he wanted to go back and he did, eating something he found in the sidewalk gutter.

I wonder what makes these birds, inhabitants of the beautiful lagoons in the fields, come to live in the cities? Where they are most at risk, because there are many children with homemade destructive devices.

The children use something called “gomeras” (slingshots) which is a small branch in the shape of a “Y” and at both upper ends they attach a rubber band, sufficiently rigid and elastic. This rubber is attached tightly to each side of the upper end of the “Y” branch, once stretched the center of the rubber becomes the best place to place a small stone in. It’s used by children in many cases to hit birds or creeping animals like lizards.

It’s cruel, but for children that’s fun. Aim at the birds and kill them. I don't think their parents have told them that this is cruelty, much less told them not to do it. It’s probably a relief for parents that their children remain on the street and not disturbing them at home.

Returning to the herons, I like to see them in the ponds in the field but it saddens me to see them in these puddles around here. Because it makes me thing that something happens in their natural habitats that scatters them in search of other less natural and favorable places for them to live.