I Hate Herons!

[Wanda hornsey]

I am so so cross, never even seen a heron fly near my house neither have my neighbours who have fish ponds...but the dog was whinning to go out at 4am so Husband got up took her in the garden and she was off like a shot....she only just missed the heron as it took off after eating 70 Goldfish, Shebunkins, newts and small koi.....gutted Now netted pond but so cross and miss my little fish friends

 

[BettaUK]

I am so so cross, never even seen a heron fly near my house neither have my neighbours who have fish ponds...but the dog was whinning to go out at 4am so Husband got up took her in the garden and she was off like a shot....she only just missed the heron as it took off after eating 70 Goldfish, Shebunkins, newts and small koi.....gutted Now netted pond but so cross and miss my little fish friends

Sorry for your loss, I know how you must feel! We lost a lot of the large gold fish from my parents pond to the local heron. We all end up covering our ponds in the end..

 

[Flik]

so sorry to hear that its gutting cos you cant do anything to them either to stop it.

we lost about 30 fish including shebunkins, fantails, comets, orfs, red cap arandas etc, and most of my frogs id raised from tadpoles only 2 fish were left.

hope your pond recovers!!

 

[Wanda hornsey]

Thanks for the kind words, a nice neighbour is giving us a few of his to keep the filters sorted till we get back from holiday.

 

[samyboy]

i know exactly how you feel ive often found a koi over a foot long on the bank with a hole stright through it, we have a large field with quite a big pond, i chased it across the field in my car the other day beeping the horn like mad, a few days later i watched a crow swoop and dive chasing this heron all over the place, but he's back again........stupid damn protected bird

 

[BettaUK]

i know exactly how you feel ive often found a koi over a foot long on the bank with a hole stright through it, we have a large field with quite a big pond, i chased it across the field in my car the other day beeping the horn like mad, a few days later i watched a crow swoop and dive chasing this heron all over the place, but he's back again........stupid damn protected bird

I know they are a pest to us Ornamental Fish Keepers, but Heron only doing what their supposed to do.. The big problem is that they often catch fish that are too big to carry away somewhere safe.

As you said they are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Taking any drastic approach, can leave you liable for a large fine. Just aswell you didn't manage to catch up with it in the car!

 

[MasterP]

I've never had fish get eaten by herons but instead i have my fish get stolen by racoons and stupid neighbors that cloroxed our pond cause he thought it was dirty.

 

[F.O.H]

i use to have problem with herons on my pond, but what i found worked is buy some bamboo sticks/poles and place them round your pond then tie some visible string from each peice of the bamboo round the perimeter of the pond then do the same half way down the bamboo i found that stops the herons flight path and SHOULD keep the pesky birds away from the goldies etc. usually very effective.

i have never had any complaints about this method but on one occasion a small sparrow did get tangled in the string.

 

[samyboy]

we used to have electric fence wire (not live) but was an eye sore, saw the ruddy thing take off again today but the fish came up to feed despite his previous presance i spent 3 hours removing oxygenating weed and dead bulrushes

 

[koimom]

Here are the ideas I've heard about to get rid of herons:

1: A plastic heron, or pair of plastic herons. Move them every day around the pond. This will make the other herons think the pond is already "owned".

2: A plastic alligator head in the pond. Herons are scared of alligators, and will avoid the pond if they think one is in it.

3: Plants around the pond that look like snakes could hide in them. (A rubber snake, moved around the plants, to look more real.) Herons don't like poisonous snakes, and try to avoid them.

4: There's a sprinkler, called THE SCARECROW, with a motion sensor on it, that will squirt ANYTHING that comes close to the pond. A lot of people I know swear by this one.

5: A "Koi Kastle", a sort of mesh tunnel, for your koi to hide in can also help.

6: Be sure your pond is over 3 feet deep and has straight sides, so the heron doesn't have a place to perch and hunt from.

You can find these items at the following website:

http/www.pondshop.com/catalog/seasons.htm

Good luck!

 

[diburning]

i know exactly how you feel ive often found a koi over a foot long on the bank with a hole stright through it, we have a large field with quite a big pond, i chased it across the field in my car the other day beeping the horn like mad, a few days later i watched a crow swoop and dive chasing this heron all over the place, but he's back again........stupid damn protected bird

I know they are a pest to us Ornamental Fish Keepers, but Heron only doing what their supposed to do.. The big problem is that they often catch fish that are too big to carry away somewhere safe.

As you said they are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Taking any drastic approach, can leave you liable for a large fine. Just aswell you didn't manage to catch up with it in the car!

you;'re lucky you didn't drive into the pond lol

 

[samyboy]

hahaha no the pond has banks around it (ill post up some pics oneday) and thanks for those heron ideas we have one plastic one, it worked for a few weeks but i think our visitor has got used to it, *random plastic bird story* a small pond near my house has a plastic female duck on it, and a real male duck has tanken a fancy to this plastic one so he now lives on this pond although when you walk past he plays dead, not moving at all just drifts around the pond as if he's plastic too, all quite amusing specially the first time, i sware that duck just moved ........ hang on its fake...........holy moly its its real

 

[sheba]

Plastic herons do not work in my opinion and definitely NOT in the breeding season!!! I have the Scarecrow by Contech which is good.
But this is the best deterrent....

 

[samyboy]

a causualty from a few months back, the post on the left is 4inches in diameter

 

[Tuishimi]

That stinks. We had our pond fish swiped by something over night, we couldn't tell what. Racoon or a skunk maybe? We also had fox and coyote around.

Once, however, we had minnows DEPOSITED by some aninal into our pond. That was pretty cool.