The Birds

[helen]

While strolling through the (Ala Moana) park in the very, very month of April, I came across a pair of birds that I didn't recongize. Since I had a digital camera handy I was able to take a few shots of this bird. Anyone got any idea what kind of bird this is? It was slighty larger than the pigeons.

[Glen Miyashiro]

They're 'auku'u, a.k.a. black crowned night herons. They were probably looking for fish and/or 'a'ama crabs. Funny little guys, aren't they?

[pzarquon]

Wow, Glen! A birdwatcher, are you?

Here's a page on the black crowned night heron (http://www.honoluluzoo.org/black-crowned_night_heron.htm) from the Honolulu Zoo. And here's a photograph (http://emedia.leeward.hawaii.edu/frary/pic141.htm) on the LCC website by one Peter Kun Frary.

[Albert]

Those are such delightful birds! Very clever, too. They hang around waiting for people to throw bread into the water for the fish and then they swoop down and come up with a fish in their mouths. One of them is very greedy and often has a difficult time swallowing the catch. (They swallow them, live of course, head first, and then sit and gulp for a few minutes before starting to look for another one.)

At Ala Moana there are at least three of them, and they hang around by the pond at the DH end during the day, at sunset usually move to the other end of the park and continue waiting for the bread-throwers.

[helen]

I visited Magic Island at least 3 times this week at different times of the day but I haven't seen the herons since then even though I make it point to cross the bridge where I first saw them.

What really surprised me is that I spotted a chicken roaming around in the park. URL below is a photo:

http://www.hawaiistories.com/gallery/album35/Pcdv0026

[Albert]

Well, that is new! In almost 15 years I have never seen a chicken in Ala Moana Beach Park.

If the herons aren't near the big pond at the DH end of the park, they'll be down at the Ewa end.

[helen]

Found the 3rd heron while passing thru the bridge. This one is bluish while the other 2 were brown. I didn't see it catch a fish but it was trying to eat one and I was able to photograph a good number of shots. The thumbnail is part of the photograph taken. The entire image and others are at:

http://www.hawaiistories.com/gallery/album35

[helen]

Went to Magic Island today to attempt to film the sunset but when I got to the R/C Boat Pond there was at least 6 herons, 3 of them sported blue and white coloring, 1 was brown and 2 were stripped brown.

There was a group of people throwing bread into the water to attact the fish closer to the shore so that the herons could catch it. One of the birds got a fish but it later dropped it.

Took a lot of images, if I find any good ones I will post to the HawaiiStories gallery. And yeah I missed the sunset but watching these birds in action was interesting.

[helen]

Here are the images (http://www.hawaiistories.com/gallery/album48) from Saturday's encounter. All taken with a SiPix SC-3300 digital camera. Most of the images were at the 2X digital zoom setting, there might be one or two at the 3X digital zoom setting.

[Albert]

"Here are the images from Saturday's encounter."

Well done, Helen. You keep getting that very greedy one who catches a fish larger than it can easily swallow.

[helen]

Sunday's encounter was pretty interesting. One of the herons already had a big fish in it's bill. It had dropped the fish a couple of times and the fish was alive enough to splash in the water but only to be caught again by the heron.

I am just wondering how come the heron is not bright enough to move a couple of feet inland after catching the fish.

[Albert]

Helen wondered: "I am just wondering how come the heron is not bright enough to move a couple of feet inland after catching the fish."

Sometimes lazy human fishermen will grab the catch if they do that.

[helen]

I guess those herons got an ISP and was reading HawaiiThreads.com because one of them today after catching a fish moved about 3 to 4 feet inland and started to eat the fish. During the process it had dropped the fish and since it was on a slope the fish managed to tumble down to the pond to escape being dinner for the heron.

[Albert]

"since it was on a slope the fish managed to tumble down to the pond to escape being dinner for the heron."

That was one lucky fish! (But I have seen that happen before.)