Prey flight behaviors in response to wading bird disturbances and their influence on foraging strategy of Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias)

Abstract

A geometric model using idealized prey behaviors in reaction to wading bird disturbances was developed to hypothesize how wading bird foraging strategy might most efficiently counter those behaviors. The model suggests that for prey responding to wading bird disturbances with flight response distance strongly negatively correlated to their distance from the point of disturbance, wading birds could employ disturbance facilitated social foraging strategy, thereby increasing individual foraging efficiency and selecting for social foraging. In controlled studies of the reactive behaviors of two primary prey species seen to be taken at disparate rates by solitary and socially foraging herons, schooling Shiner Surfperch exhibited behaviors favoring social foraging in herons, while Staghorn Sculpins exhibited no correlation in their flight response distances relative to their proximity to the disturbance, and seemed unlikely to be more efficiently utilized by socially foraging wading birds.