When fences don't make good neighbors

In March, when people were told to hunker down at home to avoid the spread of COVID-19, traffic in Fallbrook sharply declined and bingeing on TV series became a familiar routine, some newcomers moved into a quiet part of northwest Fallbrook. Their identity was as surprising to their neighbors as the home they selected; three pairs of Great Blue Herons began building nests, a hundred feet up, in a star pine tree on Elder Street.

With average wingspans of 6 feet, the male herons spent several weeks soaring from the pine tree's crown and returning with sticks for the females to weave into nests....