I've been stressing over this Heron on or in - on I guess, the side - somehow - I didn't get to see exactly how it was perched, I just know it wasn't in the water because the way that thing took off? There would have been good sized ripples in the water from that and that water was calm.
How many fish did it eat? It SEEMED like my pond was almost empty of fish - but in that particular pond, they have a GREAT hiding place under that extremely dense and wide Yerba Mensa plant. It is huge and it's roots are so dense and thick, no bird is going to stuff it's head through that entanglement.
So after more than a week of not seeing hardly any fish in there - but totally Jonesing about losing any more - I went out there a few minutes ago, threw some Koi pellets in there and lo and behold, a whole slew of fish appeared out of nowhere! That is what I had hoped had happened, but I had lost hope after seeing the Blue Heron there yesterday and not seeing any normal amounts of fish in a long time. I am assuming they were all hiding under there when that bird shows up - however much it has shown up there - and fearing for their lives.
From what I just saw, if I have lost any fish, it isn't that many. I don't have a count of fish in there, I just know what it looks like when they all come out of hiding. So that was very cool to find that many of them there and even cooler to know that that huge Yerba Mensa is doing one of it's jobs.
Umm, but I have to address the problem with the Yerba Mensa and I have the answer. Those leaf eating wasps or whatever they are are slowly decimating that plant. I can just throw some of my nursery grade screening over it during the day. It will still get sunlight but those wasps will not have access to eating up the leaves.
I don't have such bright ideas with my Taro, however, of the likes those wasps are also eating up in there. Well, I sort of do. I already have 4 posts around that pond with nursery grade sun screen on the top. I could surround the entire thing with the screen and those wasps would have no way in there.
That is going to cost money, however, and this month? Money is tight.
Well, anyway, wrapping this one up.
ben
