While at Rough River Lake this weekend, our friend David mentioned going to look for the bald eagles. Immediately interested, Steve asked, "What bald eagles? There are bald eagles here?" David answered that yes, there are at least three at the lake, and they can usually be seen in a certain cove. David said that he had seen "him" on the 4th of July, sitting there on the tree branch, as pretty as you please. We laughed when he said the sight made him feel like a proud American, and we made plans to go by boat to see the eagles that afternoon.
Our luck being what it is, we looked for hours and never saw anything but buzzards. "You do know the difference between a buzzard and a bald eagle, right, David?" I kidded him. Several people around verified their existence, with one woman saying that she had photographed one of the eagles catching a fish and feeding it to the juvenile bird. We left the cove determined to return the next day, and to see the eagles for ourselves.
Steve and I set out at around 10:30 the next morning, journeying the 40 minutes or so by boat to the eagle cove. As soon as we pulled in, I spotted an eagle. "There! Right there in that tree!" I exclaimed and pointed. "You can see the white head!" (I am glad I spotted it first. I "won.") The eagle was sitting in a very tall tree, just as David had described. We could also hear the shrieking sounds they were making. I've heard that sound on television, and it cannot be mistaken for anything else. As we intently peered into the foliage, we were able to identify not one eagle, but three. And one of them was huge! Big, black and, honestly, quite ugly, it dwarfed the other large bird on the branch above. The one facing us looked like in the pictures, with the white head and yellow beak. The eagle sitting off to the side was the smallest of the three. We took photos of them and simply floated in the water, watching for any movement. Eventually, one flapped it's wings and left the tree. I scrambled for my camera and managed to get some shots of it flying. I hoped it might swoop down and pluck a fish out of the water, but it instead flew higher and higher. Immediately, I was struck by just how high the eagle was. He quickly became a speck in the sky. I understood for the first time the meaning of "soar," while witnessing his flight. He disappeared from view, and one of the others flew off. The third one moved to another tree, and out of our sight. We marveled at our experience; neither of us had ever seen an eagle in the wild before. It was remarkable.
Steve decided that the biggest eagle with the white head was the male, the other white-headed one was the juvenile, and the black one was the female. He reasoned that she would be less attractive, as is usually the case with female birds. Steve's cousin had told us that he has been under the nests when the trees are bare, and the nests are wide enough to lie down in. Still amazed that no one had ever mentioned the eagles to us before, we decided to look for them each time we visit the lake.
Today I did some reading about eagles, and I discovered that Steve was wrong. The female is larger than the male, and colored the same, and the juvenile is black and brown. It takes 5 years for the eagle to reach it's adult plumage. This means that the black bird we saw is an enormous female younger than age 5. (At least that's what we think.) Bald eagles mate for life, but when one dies, the survivor will take a new mate. Eagle's nests are typically five feet in diameter, and the birds often return to the same nest, year after year. The nests are usually about 100 feet up in a tree. And, the birds fade from view so quickly because they fly at 10,000 feet! Amazing!
Ben Franklin wrote that he wished the bald eagle had not been chosen as the symbol of our country, because he felt it was a bird of "bad moral character." Franklin thought the turkey was a much better choice. I, for one, am glad that the decision was not up to Ben Franklin!
The turkey. Good grief.
