Simon Barnes Author and Journalist

Sports and Wild Blog

Simon Barnes
  • Home
  • Biog
  • Blog
  • Books
  • Pictures
  • Contact
  • Twitter

How to eat a meal as tall as yourself

18 October 2017 by Simon Barnes 2 Comments

You’d think that the more time you spend looking at wildlife, and especially, the more time you spend watching wildlife in the same place, the sooner you’d reach capacity. Seen everything, done everything, watched the place dry. But of course, it’s the complete opposite: the more you observe the ordinary, the more capable you become of noticing the exceptional.

Black-headed herons are pretty much of a size with the grey herons we see in England. You routinely find both species in the Luangwa Valley in Zambia, a place I’ve been many times. The blackheads are more likely to be found away from water, and in large numbers.

Tall birds, standing four feet tall. And yet here was one with a snake in its beak: and the snake reached all the way to the ground. It was an astonishingly ambitious catch for the bird, especially when the snake turned out to be a black-necked spitting cobra, a venomous snake that can spit venom a couple of yards and more to blind its would-be attacker.

The snake was still alive. It kept changing shape: concertinaing itself up in zigzags, falling straight again and then writhing to get free. As a general principle, the bird held the snake crosswise, high in the beak at the strongest part of the grip. Mostly the snake’s head was protruding three or four inches only.

But from this basic position bird and snake changed positions again and again. The bird repeatedly banged the snake’s head on the ground and tried to crack the snake’s entire body-length like a whip. It was a protracted business: the snake wasn’t keen on dying and knew that it still had a chance, if a small one. Eventually the heron had the snake more or less subdued; and then it was able to crush the cobra’s skull between the mandibles of its beak.

That seemed to leave the hardest problem till last: how to eat the damn thing. The heron took its time: you want to get this just right. Eventually the snake was manoeuvred until it was precisely headfirst, so the scales of the snake’s skin were lined up down the throat, so they would aid rather than inhibit the next stage — the long impossible sword-swallower’s swallow.

Inch by inch, clap by clap of the great bill, shake by shake of the implacable black head, the snake made his last journey: a posthumous slither down the heron’s throat. Not everyone can swallow a meal as tall as himself. Finally, with four inches of tail still protruding, the heron relaxed. Why not? That day’s work was surely now complete.

I looked him up in the great bird-book, Roberts’ Birds of Southern Africa. It said that black-headed herons will take “small reptiles”. Smaller than a Luangwa croc, I suppose, but not much…

· I was co-leading the Sacred Combe Safari with Chris Breen from www.wildlifeworldwide.com

http://www.wildlifeworldwide.com/group-tours/sacred-combe-safari

Share this:

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Posted in Wildblog

Comments

  1. Barbara Wheeler says

    19 October 2017 at 3:49 pm

    ThAnkyou for this

    Reply
  2. Di says

    20 October 2017 at 7:35 pm

    Spellbound…,,I saw it all- thanks to your amazing description I was there too. Many thanks Simon!!

    Reply

Please leave a comment Cancel reply

Receive Blog Updates By Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to my blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 5,468 other subscribers.

Recent Comments

  • Penny Woollams on Swift as a bow from an arrow…
  • Rob Howell on Swift as a bow from an arrow…
  • Jolyon Barton on Swift as a bow from an arrow…
  • Michael Clark on Cousin Caterpillar… one day he’ll wake with wings
  • Alan P on Swift as a bow from an arrow…

Categories

  • Myblog (7)
  • Sportsblog (7)
  • Wildblog (215)

Archives

  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • July 2018
  • May 2018
  • February 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • June 2017
  • April 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014

© Simon Barnes · info@simonbarnesauthor.co.uk
Home page photograph © David Bebber · Bird drawings © foxillustration.com
Created by Purple Hippo

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.