On a morning walk in the Marloth Nature reserve one looks over into the Greater Kruger National Park. We spotted a Goliath Heron, which is the biggest Heron found in Africa on her nest. The heron was busy feeding her chick. Beautiful natural sounds and bird songs in the background and a lazy hippo returning to the waters after a night out grazing along the river bank. Marloth Park is a holiday town situated on the southern boundary of the Kruger National Park.

The Goliath heron, also known as the giant heron, is a very large wading bird of the heron family. The Goliath heron is very aquatic, even by heron standards, rarely venturing far from a water source and preferring to fly along waterways rather than move over land. Eggs are pale blue, and incubation lasts 24 to 30 days. Although they can sometimes replace clutches, often only around 25% of eggs succeed in hatching due to various environmental conditions or predation. The young are fed by regurgitation in the nest and, after a few weeks, can bill jab and practice defensive postures against each other. At around five weeks they leave the nest completely. The parents continue to tend to them for variously 40 to 80 days. Around 62% of fledglings who successfully leave the nest survive to adulthood. Locally, the white-tailed eagle and the African fish eagle may be a predator at colonies. Due its size and formidable bill, the full-grown Goliath heron may not have any regular avian predators.