There is a marsh bird called a bittern. It's sort of a plump brown heron looking bird with a spindle beak like a sandhill. They have the unususal habit of not flying when you get close but stick their head and beak straight up in the air and think they are invisible. They ain't!

A big "flight" of them came into Ocean Pond one year and I put my kid brother in the front of the jon boat and we went bittern grabbing. He'd get'em by the neck and stick them in the boat's live well. They all went for his eyes when he'd grab them. We turned'em all loose without injury to them or to us...Geo