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Hello Eagle Friends,
It was a gorgeous Monday in the valley. The air temperature was 13 degrees, but it was minus 22 with the wind chill. The
roads were slushy and ice-coated but none of that mattered. There right in front of me was the mother eagle I love so dearly
perched at the entrance to the valley, almost like she'd been waiting for my truck.
I drove past her and when I did she lifted and she flew towards her nest. She was actually following Dancer who was up above the spruce trees, also heading towards their nest about a mile north.
I hiked out to their nesting area but I was short on time today so I couldn't stay long.
When I reached Judy and The Mayor's nest I could see the top of the head of an eagle, but not enough to identify who.
Those strong winds really give these eagles a challenge while trying to brood their eggs. This is day 9 incubation for them.
When I reached nest 6 I saw an eagle fly onto their nest. As I looked at the photos tonight, it appears there is an eagle laying
beside the eagle that flew in. I wonder if they are nesting. I'm planning to spend some extra time on their nest tomorrow to see if they are incubating. I'll have some extra eyes and help with me, my old high school teacher and friend, Greg Munson who is the Executive Director of Quarry Hill Nature Center.
The geese are becoming even more intolerant of each other on the ponds. The will start nesting in the next three to four weeks so I'm sure they are all trying to find their nesting spot. One goose is especially dominant and he parades his lady goose around the pond biting her to keep her close, but he knocked several geese over today that dared to swim too close.
He flew at them driving them a hundred feet away. Then he would come back to his mate, mouth open and his neck stretched out long on the top of the water and bite his mate. Then they would swim side by side again, until the next battle of the geese began.
As I moved on I looked for that huge fish, expecting to see it partially eaten and maybe a couple crows feeding on it, but it was gone. That eagle must have come back and taken it. I still don't know how it lifted that big of a fish, but I wish I could have watched.
No rabbit today, and no opossum.
The nest 5 eagle was sitting on their nest. This is day 5 incubation for them.
When I reached nest 3, two crows flew up from the frozen marsh edge. One was smashing something against the dead tree.
When I lifted my lens to nest 3 I found both eagles sitting together on the south side. As I watched from my half mile distance, one of them flew off and perched in a nearby tree.
I shot some images of nest 4, but I didn't think they were on the nest. Tonight when looking through the nest images, they were both on the nest. This nest and nest 5 are probably going to be the hardest nests to document daily without hiking to them.
It has taken me all my life to learn to plan for each day, and not into my future. God has been really patient working that into me. What I mean by saying that is futures, at least mine, in my life's past busied me to the last moment of each day while have thinking and planning for what may or may not even be a possibility beyond a certain date.
I could spend all these months working on nests 3-6 and a flood could block me from reaching them for a period of time, like last year where the roads were closed all summer and fall.
I do these nests daily, knowing that very well could again be the result in a few weeks when these snows melt. Still I look through the 20,000 images I've shot these past 55 days and how can I not be thankful for all I have seen and been blessed with? I hope seeing these images or reading this has stirred you inside to get outside and breathe what the creator gave us
freely.
I picked Em up from school and we came home and watched Arthur and the Invisibles and then we adopted a new gerbil tonight.
I wouldn't have, but Em told me this morning how I woke her up for school when she was dreaming of this black gerbil with a white spot on his back.
Well, wouldn't you know when we went to get pet food tonight they had this four month old, black female gerbil named "Pretty Girl."
"Mom, it's just like the one in my dream. You said God was probably giving me that dream to let me know my gerbils were okay in heaven." Then she pointed, "But look mom, he has a big spot on his back just like the one in my dream."
The gerbil had a quarter-sized bald spot on his back from a fight it had been in with another gerbil. "Mom, how did God know
we'd come here?"
I just laughed as I handed her the gerbil in the cardboard box pet carrier. When we got back to the studio we set up her cage
and she jumped right into her wheel.
So we have a new gerbil named Pretty Girl.
I'm looking forward to Day 56.
See you on the journey--
Lisa
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