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Hello Eagle Friends,
It was a marvelous Tuesday in the valley. The temperature was 46 when we arrived, but had dropped down to 41 when we left late this afternoon. My daughter wanted to come with me today and see the trumpeter swans, the eagles, and the wildlife we
always seem to find waiting for our arrival.
We hiked out to our first post at nest 1. Daedee was up on the nest for day 22 incubation. I can't believe how fast the weeks have gone by. Here we are just days away from the borning eaglet cries, and yet with all the snow, and more coming this week--oh yes--another 8-9 inches; I feel winter is still holding and spring isn't getting her chance to bloom.
We saw Dancer the nest 1 male flying above us with to eaglets, probably the 2007 twins. We sat planning out our book series laughing at chapters we could write. I hope to have at least one of these titles out by fall. I'll give more details when the time is right.
We moved on to nest 2 and found Judy laying deep in the nest. There were no signs whatsoever indicating that an eaglet had been born. I've stared at a lot of sitting eagles, and she surely had a look that still said, "Eggs on board". Their expressions change, their actions, their persona all becomes edge-of-the-nest, once an eaglet comes out of their shell.
I have a good feeling about tomorrow. Day 33 has been a popular birth day for a few eaglets I know. We'll see if that proves true for tomorrow.
If he hatches on Thursday, I'll name him Blizzard, that is if we get all that snow they are predicting.
We moved on to nest 6 and found one eagle watching down at all the lesser scaup, blue bills swimming around. There were a few hooded mergansers, a couple common merganser, several geese and that is all. Em kept prompting me to leave, but I had to trust that instinct to remain. I kept telling her, "Just a few more minutes."
I really wasn't sure what I was waiting for, I only knew those strong stay or go feelings I get usually are important for me to follow. There I was waiting when I heard him, John Weiss, the Post-Bulletin Outdoor writer asking if I fell asleep?"
I laughed, and said, "Sleep, no, how can I my daughter keeps sticking her video game in my face asking me what one screen or another means."
He was shooting some pictures for the paper and we were talking about his book cover for the book we are publishing and as we were discussing adding wildlife, a perfect vertical or a black cover with a horizontal image our thoughts were broken by two sandhill cranes drifting above us and landing in the field next to us.
"There's your cover--go shoot it and I'll catch up with you in a bit."
He got a good shot too a perfectly tack-sharp picture of one of the sandhill cranes flying back over to the other pond they with a dark background. It was breath-taking. He was off to Preston, MN so we parted, but I wish he had followed me just two miles up the road because we found eight eaglets and one adult on a half melted marsh.
Nest 5 was on their nest, no eaglet news, but tomorrow is day 28 incubation for them so it's possible we could have an eaglet back there.
Then we found a big, rusty brown colored woodchuck. He was the fattest one I've seen in this valley. He was checking out a tunnel and go in and out of it to the call of a barred owl. I looked at Em and asked, "Should we tell him the reason that tunnel is vacant is because it's not prime real estate, but rather a tunnel below a red-tail hawk and barred owl perch, depending on whether he prefers coming out day or night?"
"Is that what happened to the last one mom?"
"I think so. Those woodchucks have a lot of predators out here, coyote, fox, eagle, hawks, owls and people. Last year three of them were hit just on this small stretch of road."
This woodchuck had so much personality I shot fifty or sixty pictures of him. He was chewing on the rocks, probably grinding his teeth down, then he must have had an itch so he walked down three feet and rubbed his neck up and down a forked branch on a tree, then he turned and I swear he smiled at us with those big yellow teeth, then he jumped back in his tunnel and kicked dirt out ten feet behind him.
We watched him for over a half hour and then we moved on.
Nest 3 was sitting peacefully and nest 4 was sitting quietly.
Then we headed back to Rochester.
I'm looking forward to day 78.
See you on the journey--
Lisa
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