Bald Eagle - Battered but NOT Beaten
NorthernFocus
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I was going through (hopefully) a final cull of images from my last outing with the eagles when I ran across this shot. Though not a classic eagle photo, it reminded me of that day which I thought I'd share part of.
We were specifically targeting eagle photos on this trip. One morning we set up offshore of a nest with one bird sitting on the eggs/chicks and the mate fishing from the top of a nearby tree. There was also a pack of crows scattered in the treetops, apparently waiting to swoop in on the nest should the female leave.
We didn't have to wait long before the male made a dive within reasonable camera range. When I previewed the images I wasn't too thrilled as the bird was pretty ratty looking. Missing/broken feathers and soaking wet. Eagles feathers don't shed water like ducks or seabirds so when they get wet they look... well, wet :dunno .
Anyhow, a rainshower was drifting up the bay (if you haven't seen the rainbow I posted check it out here ) and there was a lot of activity in this spot so we sat tight and watched for a while. While we sat there, the female bird in the nest frequently called. We were laughing and making jokes that she was fussing at her lazy mate to hurry up with breakfast :toni .
This time of year the birds are feeding mostly on herring and candle fish which require multiple catches to make a meal, much less feed a family. Bad for the birds, great for photography :wink Every time this guy caught a fish, he would dutifully head for the nest to drop it off with mom. That's when all hell would break loose. If there was another eagle anywhere around, they would immediately try to head him off and steal the catch (they are such shameless thieves). Barring that, the pack of crows would start swarming around him and the nest when he landed. Then the female would REALLY start shrieking for all she was worth. The male would fight with the crows for a bit then return to his tree. After a few minutes everything would settle back down, male fishing, crows on watch, female nagging. Then the scene would repeat.
We saw this evolution repeat at least half a dozen times over about an hour and a half or so. Finally after catching yet another fish, the male took his catch and went and landed on a rock at the waters edge and out of sight of the nest, presumably to take a break and grab a bite for himself.
So there's the story. And here's the image of the tattered warrior. You can see his legs are so wet from multiple dives that you can see the skin beneath the feathers. The tips of all the feathers on his right wing are mangled. The trailing edge of the feathers on both wings were all ragged which doesn't show from this angle (I also had side shots of him diving). And if you look closely at the left side of his breast (his left, right side in image) you can see a spot of pink whick I'm fairly certain (shows up in multiple images from different dives) is flesh sticking out from a wound received fighting other eagles.
In Alaska we see a lot of eagle hanging around dumps, marina fish cleaning stations, etc. Without seeing them in their natural element one can become jaded. But after witnessing things like this warrior's daily struggle to survive and procreate, one understands the awe with which Native American peoples looked upon these birds.
Battered but not Beaten
We were specifically targeting eagle photos on this trip. One morning we set up offshore of a nest with one bird sitting on the eggs/chicks and the mate fishing from the top of a nearby tree. There was also a pack of crows scattered in the treetops, apparently waiting to swoop in on the nest should the female leave.
We didn't have to wait long before the male made a dive within reasonable camera range. When I previewed the images I wasn't too thrilled as the bird was pretty ratty looking. Missing/broken feathers and soaking wet. Eagles feathers don't shed water like ducks or seabirds so when they get wet they look... well, wet :dunno .
Anyhow, a rainshower was drifting up the bay (if you haven't seen the rainbow I posted check it out here ) and there was a lot of activity in this spot so we sat tight and watched for a while. While we sat there, the female bird in the nest frequently called. We were laughing and making jokes that she was fussing at her lazy mate to hurry up with breakfast :toni .
This time of year the birds are feeding mostly on herring and candle fish which require multiple catches to make a meal, much less feed a family. Bad for the birds, great for photography :wink Every time this guy caught a fish, he would dutifully head for the nest to drop it off with mom. That's when all hell would break loose. If there was another eagle anywhere around, they would immediately try to head him off and steal the catch (they are such shameless thieves). Barring that, the pack of crows would start swarming around him and the nest when he landed. Then the female would REALLY start shrieking for all she was worth. The male would fight with the crows for a bit then return to his tree. After a few minutes everything would settle back down, male fishing, crows on watch, female nagging. Then the scene would repeat.
We saw this evolution repeat at least half a dozen times over about an hour and a half or so. Finally after catching yet another fish, the male took his catch and went and landed on a rock at the waters edge and out of sight of the nest, presumably to take a break and grab a bite for himself.
So there's the story. And here's the image of the tattered warrior. You can see his legs are so wet from multiple dives that you can see the skin beneath the feathers. The tips of all the feathers on his right wing are mangled. The trailing edge of the feathers on both wings were all ragged which doesn't show from this angle (I also had side shots of him diving). And if you look closely at the left side of his breast (his left, right side in image) you can see a spot of pink whick I'm fairly certain (shows up in multiple images from different dives) is flesh sticking out from a wound received fighting other eagles.
In Alaska we see a lot of eagle hanging around dumps, marina fish cleaning stations, etc. Without seeing them in their natural element one can become jaded. But after witnessing things like this warrior's daily struggle to survive and procreate, one understands the awe with which Native American peoples looked upon these birds.
Battered but not Beaten
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I went back and looked at a couple more images taken at the same nest site a few hours later and presumably of the same bird. It is definately a wound on his chest. A pretty large gash as a matter of fact. Hope he makes it. We'll probably have a chance to check out the nest again this coming weekend. It will have been a month since this image was taken. If their eggs hatched the chick(s) should still be in the nest and getting pretty big by now. But the salmon will be in the creeks so fishing photos will be hard to come by (the birds mainly just eat the dead ones in the creeks rather than actively fishing) :cry
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