I was able to stand quite close this heron, who didn’t seem bothered by my presence at all. I found it fascinating to watch him hunt – moving slowly and deliberately through the water, focusing on some prey, plunging his head into the water and always coming up with a small fish in his mouth.

This is a series of eight pictures (I think I’ll post) I made while watching this hunter.

Best to view in "Original" because other versions resized by Pbase are decidedly unsharp.

*****

After Tim spotted a great blue heron in an artificial lake on the National Mall the other day, we went down there on Wednesday armed with cameras to try to find him again. Not only did we find the heron, but also several cormorants and countless geese and ducks. It was pretty amazing to see the heron and cormorants on the mall as there aren’t any large fish in the water, but they seemed to make do with hunting tiny prey.

The strike, posted earlier: