What can I do to keep an egret away?

A BB gun would work. Don’t crank it up too far. Just so it stings without seriously injuring the guy. They’re probably protected.

Any chance you can build another float?

Gosh, tough one. I have a pair of geese too but they go in a barn at night and have swimming pools, not a pond. The Egret is there for hunting frogs and fish at dusk, being a waterbird himself he will capitalize on water sources. Yes, maybe build another float to provide for everyone, otherwise, maybe you can run him off by conditioning him that you will be at the pond at dusk making noise.

Maybe get a whistle or some sort of noise maker.
Of course in trying to scare him your geese will probably be stressed too.
You have my sympathies, I deal with wild turkeys flying over the fence and eating my birds feed dusk and dawn. Drives me nuts.

I throw rocks at them and my geese don’t try to defend their feed. I am always rushing the corral fence yelling ” Turks out!” lol
Nature…always a challenge.

And speaking of conditioning, the damn turkeys are so savvy to my emotional displays and rock tossing that they just casually wander off to hide behind the barn, and as soon as I walk away they are back. It is really a maddening situation. I just end up putting out about 5 lbs. of feed every day to make sure my guys don’t get shorted. They have long ago figured out my ranting has never caused them harm, so they just pretend to comply.

Passive aggressive turkeys. lol

The egret is not a predator, though… Don’t you think the geese will eventually learn this and cease to fear him?

Or is the problem that the egret is being a hog and thinks that the float is his personal throne?

I’m not worried about the egret hurting the geese. When he’s there they are scared to go on the island where it’s safe.

Perhaps a motion/infrared activated sprinkler will work. I used one (“Scarecrow” brand) to keep the deer away from my garden. It worked good. Even at night. But one time I turned off the sprinkler to work in the garden and forgot to turn it back on. The next day my garden was nearly wiped out.

@gondwanalon Like my hotwire for the deer. They just arched their necks OVER the top, I on the other hand, always forgot to turn it off and zapped myself in the damp armpit on summer mornings when picking my flowers. Flinging my coffee across the yard.

Heh…jokes on me.
A perfect Farside cartoon it was.

Maybe see if you can get another geese that isn’t such a pussy. I know at the local park you can feed the geese. Some are rather timid and shy and seem scared of everything. There are a few that are aggressive and kind of assholes. They will hiss and chase and try to bite the other ducks people and one seems to hate kids and will torment them. Maybe you can go somewhere where there are geese and you can interact with them and find a badass alpha goose that will break bad on that egret.