The definitive Great Blue Heron deterant

[swordtail]

For those with outdoor ponds, after going through many many solutions to foil racoons and herons (racoons is pretty easy, just build a pond with steep sides) I have come up with the two that work best for herons.
#2 - and simplest - string a thin nylon fishing line around the pond, TIGHT, about 18 inches high, virtually invisible. The heron cannot figure out how to get under the line and the way his neck is constructed he cannot get over the line to get at the fish. This worked well for me for about 6 months until the heron finally decided to fly directly in the pond. For those with ponds with a depth of at least 2 feet all over, this approach should work and is the simplest.
#1 - I have constructed an underwater device, powered by a small air pump. About every 2 or three minutes, the underwater balloon fills enough with bubbles from the pump, and dumps its load of air, with a large churning bubble making noise and enough movement to completely mystify the GBH. They sit on my roof for 10 minutes and then just fly off. This contraption has worked for over a year and I never lost a fish to a GBH.......

Just came back last week from a trip and all my fish were gone. When I asked my wife, she was surprised, and also commented that there had been a pretty little blue bird around the pond. Surely enough, a few minutes later the bird showed up, it was a Kingfisher, can't remember ever having seen one in British Columbia, but there it was, and completely uninterested in my contraption had taken virtually everything. Ain't nature wonderful.

 

[Holly9937]

As frustrating as I'm sure it can be to lose your fish, I'm jealous!! I'm a big bird watcher too, and I would love to have a pond of any size to attract the birds like that!! Maybe you can just stick with cheap fish and have the best of both worlds?!@?!

 

[Liel Biran]

Thwarting a kingfisher

For those with outdoor ponds, after going through many many solutions to foil racoons and herons (racoons is pretty easy, just build a pond with steep sides) I have come up with the two that work best for herons.
#2 - and simplest - string a thin nylon fishing line around the pond, TIGHT, about 18 inches high, virtually invisible. The heron cannot figure out how to get under the line and the way his neck is constructed he cannot get over the line to get at the fish. This worked well for me for about 6 months until the heron finally decided to fly directly in the pond. For those with ponds with a depth of at least 2 feet all over, this approach should work and is the simplest.
#1 - I have constructed an underwater device, powered by a small air pump. About every 2 or three minutes, the underwater balloon fills enough with bubbles from the pump, and dumps its load of air, with a large churning bubble making noise and enough movement to completely mystify the GBH. They sit on my roof for 10 minutes and then just fly off. This contraption has worked for over a year and I never lost a fish to a GBH.......

Just came back last week from a trip and all my fish were gone. When I asked my wife, she was surprised, and also commented that there had been a pretty little blue bird around the pond. Surely enough, a few minutes later the bird showed up, it was a Kingfisher, can't remember ever having seen one in British Columbia, but there it was, and completely uninterested in my contraption had taken virtually everything. Ain't nature wonderful.

Hi,
I found this old post and was wondering if anyone else has found ways to avoid giving free lunches to kingfishers.

I bought a home that has an outdoor pond with goldfish and a water-pump that runs a small waterfall when we turn it on. For the first few months all was well, and I counted over 50 goldfish. Then we spotted a kingfisher visiting and feeding - indeed a beautiful bird and crafty fish-catcher.
When, after a couple of months, I finally cleaned the pond from algae buildup (the next topic to research) - I found only 7 fish left in the pond!

We now keep the waterfall running non-stop in the hope of reducing the presence of both algae and predator, and we've thought of spreading a fish-net over the pond. Any other creative ideas?

Thanks,
Liel

 

[ct-death]

I too have 2 ponds - Smaller one for Koi, and a larger one for rainbow trout. There are two things that you cna do in addition to the above (I have used the netting, and it works great for larger birds):

Rear your fish to a larger size prior to introducing them into the pond, and get larger species of fish. We rear our koi to 10-12" before letting them outside. Since doing this, we have lost 3 in the past 6 or 7 years (we don't bother with the net anymore; the Koi are all too big even for a Heron!)

The second thing, is dig a deep hole in one spot of your pond - I'm talking 5-6+ feet (5 is minimum) - so the fish can actually escape predators when attacked. Fish are pretty good at avoiding prey from above if they have the means to do so

 

[Rbishop]

Sometimes a pergola over the area helps by blocking the line of sight.

 

[Jeox]

Ive found an adult redtail catfish seems to "deter" ANY predator. lol

 

[chaibill]

1. what is a pergola?
2. why does the red tail catfish "deter" its too big?
3. would some type of mirror work on a bird if it sees its self would it think it was another bird's territory? maybe one of those mirror globe things our grandmas keep in their gardens.
4. i don't have a pond want one, but i have seen these plastic koi that float and the bird or raccoon is confuse buy this and eventually leaves