Started a Facebook group for our neighborhood pond herons... now 300 strangers want to know their names

well I didnt think anybody would care except me and Marjorie from two doors down... but Tyler set it up for me back in August and now we have over 300 members!! Some of them dont even live in Florida... one lady is in Ohio and she says Gerald (the big blue heron) is the best part of her morning

Here's my problem... ngl people keep posting their OWN birds in there... a cardinal, somebody's parakeet, one man posted a pelican eating a whole fish which frankly nobody needed to see before breakfast... and then the group isnt about my herons anymore Tyler says I'm a "moderator" now and I can delete posts but that feels so mean... I watched a Dateline last week where it all started with a neighborhood dispute and I'd rather not end up on one lol

Also somebody asked if we could do a live stream of the pond... is that hard?? Do I need a special camera or will my phone work if I prop it up on the patio table... I already have the motion camera but Tyler says thats "not the same thing"

How do you all keep a group on topic without hurting feelings... do you write rules at the top or is that too bossy... I feel the same way about the pick

lol the pelican guy is never gonna stop now, he knows he has an audience. just make a weekly "other birds" thread and delete everything that lands outside it. people will follow the rule as long as they still get to show off their parakeet somewhere

also Gerald having a fan in Ohio is the best thing i've read all week. my aunt once got really invested in a webcam of a goose in Saskatchewan and called us crying when it moved on. so be ready for that, Ohio lady is going to need updates if he ever leaves

oh my goodness your poor aunt... thats exactly what I'm afraid of!! gerald has been at our pond for three years now so I dont think he's going anywhere... but last week he skipped a morning and I had nine messages asking if he was ok... one of them was from the Ohio lady of course Tyler says I should post a "Gerald is fine" update every day so nobody panics but I watched a Dateline on Thursday night and now I'm a little nervous about telling 300 strangers exactly where and when to find him every morning... maybe I'll just say "the pond" and leave it at that... Just my

ok so update I took Tyler's advice halfway and decided I'll post a "Gerald is fine" picture every couple of days but never the same day I take it, and I cropped out the HOA sign behind the cattails... somebody already asked me which side of the pond has parking so they could "drop by"!! I'm sure they're perfectly nice but no thank you... gerald doesnt need visitors and I dont need strangers parking on my grass. Just my two cents!!

oh nooo the "drop by" comment!! lol i'd maybe switch the group to private and add a couple screening questions, like "what's your favorite heron fact" or something... anyone who cant answer doesnt get in fun trivia, pond herons stay totally camouflaged until they fly and then BAM, bright white wings!! poor gerald is basically a celebrity now who never signed up for it also i once started a group for the meteor showers here and forgot about it for six months, came back and it was 80% people selling sunglasses, so maybe keep an eye on the members list lol

yeah PickleballPam58 nothing keeps Gerald safe like a delayed proof of life photo. cropping out the HOA sign was smart tho, now they'll have to find the pond by heron vibes alone. i ran a fan page for a parking lot goose once and some guy showed up with bread and a lawn chair. "drop by" means they're bringing snacks

oh no teh bread... people still think every bird wants bread!! Gerald eats fish and frogs and one time I watched him swallow a whole baby snake, so anybody showing up with a loaf of Publix bread is gonna be real disappointed... and then they'd probably leave teh bag on the bank too, same people who leave their carts in the handicap spot I bet I just watched a Dateline where it all started with somebody "dropping by" so im not doing that I might just turn off comments for a while... just my two cents!!

turning off comments works switching the group to private with membership questions works better, then you can just decline anyone who answers "where exactly is the pond" lol https://www.facebook.com/help/1686671141596230

and fwiw herons are federally protected under the migratory bird treaty act, so if anyone shows up with a bag of bread you can point them here https://www.fws.gov/law/migratory-bird-treaty-act-1918

also most strangers asking for the names arent planning a Dateline episode. they just want to know which one is Gerald

wait i just realized my last post cut off mid sentence lol... honestly i was gonna say i once started a group for my backyard telescope meetups and forgot to post in it for 8 months!! so you're already doing way better than me

one thing i'd add is check your photos before posting, some phones put the exact gps location in the file. strip that out and maybe just say "a pond somewhere in town"... people can still love gerald without knowing which bench to sit on

also 300 people is kind of amazing?? i'd make it a we

"drop by" means they're bringing snacks

lol the HOA sign was never the problem if the original file got uploaded with EXIF intact, the GPS coordinates are sitting right there in the metadata https://exiftool.org

also you cant leave "i ran a fan page for" hanging like that. for WHAT

lowkey facebook strips the EXIF data on upload, so the GPS isnt really the leak. the leak is the 40 photos with the water tower and the hand painted "no feeding wildlife, ordinance 12-4" sign in the background... our city is the only one around here that made it a $75 fine and then put the sign up in comic sans

also i'd like to know what the fan page was for too. i ran a forum for a discontinued watch movement for six years so nobody's getting judged here...

correction to my own post, facebook strips EXIF on upload so the GPS thing probably wasnt it. ngl the comic sans sign is way more findable than metadata anyway

six years on a discontinued movement is respectable. ngl i've spent longer than that in a thread about lubing stabilizer wires and it still hasnt settled whether dielectric grease