Posted on 05/17/2021 4:04:19 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Oregon is covered with them especially in Southern Oregon.
The first time I ever saw one in the wild, it was enjoying some roadkill on the shoulder of a back road. When I was a kid I'd always see them on TV soaring magnificently, swooping and plucking fish out of the water, etc.
Kind of a let down to see my first one in real life tearing into roadside carrion.
On a bike ride several years ago as I passed a parking lot, I saw a hawk sitting atop a rabbit that was easily triple its size. On my return trip, there were no remnants of the rabbit on the ground.
Saw a hawk swoop down on a pigeon sitting on a sign post at a gas station. Somehow, the pigeon escaped. Another time while driving on the interstate, a hawk landed on something in the center island. Pounced on it a couple of times before I drove past it. Never could tell what it was. I've witnessed hawks from a distance a couple of other times circling and then dive-bombing, but I was too far away to know what its prey was.
Lastly, and most shockingly, I saw a hawk circling overhead about a block or 2 away while I was letting our dog out - small breed, was less than a year old at the time. Next thing I know, the hawk was on a branch on our neighbor's tree that overhangs into our yard. It was likely coming in for the kill and must've aborted when it saw me in the yard as well.
I've seen a bald eagle up close - but in a cage - as it was being transported from Alaska to a wildlife refuge in Long Island.
As impressive as hawks are, I can only imagine the damage a bald eagle could do in the wild. IIRC, there's a YouTube video out there of a bald eagle trying to lift a fawn.
The eagle is toast.
Heck. When I visited Alaska in ‘79...the skies were full of them.
Credit for much of the recovery of the bald eagle needs to go to “The Eagle Lady” Jean Keene, in Alaska.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Keene
Just a few birds were active in the sheltered harbor of Homer Alaska, and she took to feeding them, which allowed many more to survive the winter without starving. After a time, dozens then hundreds of birds assembled near her home there.
After they reached a threshold number, when spring arrived, more and more of the normally territorial birds started to migrate east and south, into Canada and Washington/Oregon states. There, finding much richer habitat, their numbers in the wild boomed.
Little did she know that her actions put the lie to endangered animal environmentalism. One of its big lies is that endangered animals can only be helped by forcing humans out of the same space. But she and others have demonstrated that the *best* way to help endangered animals, and even plants, is to breed lots of them that then interbreed with wild animals.
Eagles are predators but lovely. That is their job.
Do not put small animals outside that are not native to the area. Native animals understand the danger. Non native animals are just lunch.
> “National Eagle Center” in Wabasha, Minnesota. Eagles congregate along that stretch of the Mississippi River...
Wow, it’s amazing that the eagles know to congregate right by the national center.
......It’s a joke son.
I just don’t understand whythe United States should be represented by a predator...or any totem animal.
How would you know that? That means you've eaten Bald Eagle.
You can do worse than Bald Eagle. Not as gamey as California Condor. Not as chewy as Spotted Owl.
Looks better?
We see baldies occasionally, usually in remote areas near rivers and such. Only twice in my life have I seen a Golden Eagle — apparently they VERY occasionally overwinter in the mid-south USA.
The best view of a flying Bald Eagle I’ve seen, though, was on the IL side of the I-24 bridge over the Ohio River. We had just come from under the IL side arch, entering IL, and this Bald Eagle came smoothly gliding over the bridge, maybe 10-12 ft. above the bridge deck, at about a 15 deg. angle to the bridge. So it was going almost the same direction we were, crossing just in front of us. (My thought was that if a semi had been just barely forward of our position, it might have hit the eagle, unless the eagle saw it and veered away.) The eagle instead sailed serenely toward the IL shoreline... Maybe it was headed to the riverboat @ Metropolis - Hahaha.
Sunny day, deep clear blue sky, head and tail feathers gleaming bright... Say what you will, that was magnificent and awesome, and no wild turkey can create anything like that experience. (We have plentiful wild turkeys around here now — interesting birds to be sure, but, magnificent? Nope...)
Wild turkeys indeed don’t feed on road kills, but, they will circle such in a field, trying to figure out what it is, perhaps? I saw 4 or 5 doing so a few days ago, on the edge of a local WMA. When I passed by again a few hours later, the more usual vultures had gathered around the deer carcass & the turkeys were gone.
Or... https://www.popsci.com/turkeys-circle-dead-cat/
:-)
It is pretty much normal human nature, expressed in many civilizations and cultures.
Flight in general is often symbolic of freedom, and with a bald eagle, a close encounter with one in flight (see my experience posted just above) invokes a simultaneous feeling of freedom, awe and majesty that is striking and quite memorable. My wife, daughter, and I were all "Wowwwwwww!!"
It’s like deer knowing they should cross the road by the “Deer Crossing” signs.
Growing up on a struggling farm the sight of predator birds meant the chickens were in danger.
I’ve lost a puppy and several cats to predator birds.
Maybe those big wind things have redeeming factors.
Not so majestic when you see a dozen of them eating a dead calf's carcass. They didn't kill the calf but they eat rotting stuff just like vultures do.
To be sure, we’ve lost a few of my daughter’s flock of free range (most of the time) chickens, and 2 chicks, to hawks and big owls over the years. But, interestingly, so far, not when we’ve had a large rooster with hawk-like coloring. And, none to any predator when we’ve had a medium size dog. Sans dog, other neighborhood dogs and raccoons have been the most problematic predators. (The raccoons are REALLY smart.) Opossums have gotten a couple too, but “dog proof traps” have whittled down the raccoons and opossums considerably. I’ve yet to see an eagle near our property - they mostly stay near the rivers and lakes.
That all said, sans dog we try to make sure one of us is within earshot if the chickens are to be left out. (They have nice big houses - one is a converted shed.) If there is going to be more than a half hour (at most) trip to the bank or Post Office, etc., the chickens don’t get let out. But, “something” ripped a very nasty head wound in a friendly stray tomcat that hangs around here sometimes. Whether it was predator or prey, we don’t know.
On the good side, the usual hawks and owls kill a LOT of rodents.
Not quite the same sizewize as an eagle, but still impressive - A couple of weeks ago, during my morning run where the bike trail branches off from the road by the golf course with the forest close by on the left, I must have noticed a movement on the standing tree trunk. When I stopped, just a few feet in front of me was a pileated woodpecker with its wings spread diagonally across the trunk. Of course, before I could whip out my camera, it quickly worked its way to the other side of the tree and flew off in the under story of the woods using some appropriate woodpecker language. I later concluded that the reason for the spread wing pose was that I was standing in its escape route and it had to develop a Plan B.
The configuration from where I stopped was a past double tree with one stem near to me being a hollow stump. My first thoughts were that the bird might be nesting in the hollow stump, but examination showed that it had been digging for grubs or worms in the stump vicinity.
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