Hello Eagle Friends,
I think the storms have calmed down long enough to write without worrying that my electricity will flicker down to a halt.
It was 76 degrees when we reached the valley today under overcast skies and the threat of on and off showers. That all changed about the second we stopped the truck to hike out to nest 1. Suddenly there were tornado warnings issued in surrounding areas.
Knowing that weather changes fast, we opted for a very short stay. It started sprinkling as we began our hike, but by the time
we reached our post the rain was pouring down. Daniels Charlie was up on the nest and he didn't seem to mind the rain at all.
Every so often he would shake off the rain that had collected on his feathers.
We kept hoping D'ODEE would come into view, but where he was on the nest he was probably not going to move just for us.
We left and headed to nest 2. As I passed a small dark object on the road something within me screamed to stop. I backed up and told Em, "We have another animal to help."
"What is it mom, a toad?"
"Nope. I'm not really sure what kind, but it is a baby bird."
I lifted her up and she was shaking from being wet and cold. I don't know how the truck in front of me had missed her, and I didn't even want to think how many other vehicles had drove over her or passed her. "Mom, we would have missed her wouldn't we if we had done the other nests first?"
"Your right Em. She probably would have been hit. Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing us doing nest 1 first and getting soaked."
Em pulled a towel out and began dabbing her dry. I was scanning trees for a nest, still unsure what kind bird this was. It sounded much like a baby robin the couple chirps we heard, but it was too small to be a robin, and hardly big enough to have fledged. My guess is the storms from last night and all morning blew this bird out of its nest, or blew the nest tree down.
It wasn't until the bird dried that we discovered it was a nuthatch. Em drew him in her journal, that and a tornado that I told her to draw. The weather forecast was changing by the minute and we once again found ourselves in the safest place in six surrounding counties.
I laughed when she handed me her journal and said, "I drew a cow by the tornado."
I know she was thinking of the movie Twister, where a cow gets picked up by a tornado, twice. I just loved her sketch of the nuthatch.
At nest 2 we found 62 day old Terry Gail flying up off the nest a few inches, and I shot several pictures as the large brown and white speckled eaglet flew over to the opposite side of the nest. This eagle could fledge anytime now, but lets hope it's not during the storms tomorrow or the next few days.
We found 3 gosling's who I believe were the Marsh 1a or 1b gosling's there was another family with only two gosling's but they were too young to be the two that marsh 1b Canada geese were rearing. This was probably a different pair of Canada geese.
At nest 6 we found the twins up on the nest.
At nest 5 they twins were dark shadows in the overcast light. The skies were layers upon layers of dark and light clouds. The tornado warnings in a couple counties were reissued, and now they posted a flash flood warning for our county where we were for the night anyway.
A car stopped and the lady driver asked if I'd seen a couple guys walking. I told them I had not. She said they left to canoe the river this morning at 5 AM, and had not returned yet. I hope they made t out okay. I hope they didn't get hung up on the Twin tree.
At nest 3 I saw Victory Bell on the back side of the nest and took a few shots. I couldn't see anything on nest 4. Then I stopped to photograph the damselflies and dragonflies who would zig across the tops of the grasses as i took each step, probably knocking them into the air while they were trying to stay dry under the curl of a grass blade.
Then I saw him. Old gold eyes the big bullfrog that has had Em and me searching for over a couple weeks trying to locate him.
Well I finally saw him, he blew his cover answering a frog in the ditch with the ditch fish. I stepped down on the ground by him, all I had to do was step over one foot onto the little chunk of grasses where he was.
I stepped down and my left leg dropped to my knee, and would have gone further down had I not thrown my weight back quickly from this floating bog. I don't find only a handful of those a year, but I'm forever on guard for them. The water was probably only 6 feet deep there, but I didn't feel like falling in just for a frog.
As we headed back two young men from Northfield, Minnesota stopped to ask me some questions on the river. They didn't know there was a flash flood warning. I showed them on their map where to pull over in their canoe and walk the sandbar to avoid the Twin tree.
They had never been down here and the other young man said, "We took the corner and my mouth just dropped it was so beautiful here."
"Welcome to the valley--one trip and you'll want to come back again and again."
"We work all the time and we had this weekend off so I called him." He pointed to his friend and continued, "I told him, we're going."
I just love to see that spark in people's eyes when they reach this place. It is like they have found a treasure. Mostly, I enjoy how they appreciate the beauty.
Up the road a little further a snapping turtle was sitting in the middle again. "No, not again." I though chuckling at the turtle the other day that I got out of the road.
This one moved quickly for a turtle, almost a sprint for him. He was safe once off the road. Then up the road it happened again. A second turtle who didn't want to budge and then he insisted on going up the bluff, against all my efforts to turn him in the right direction. So it is true, you can lead a turtle to water but you can't make him drink, and if he wants to climb a bluff first then you let him.
I saw an adult eagle fishing over a marsh by nest 3 and it was probably one of the parents. I hardly had my lens focused when the eagle spotted something ahead and took after it. It returned to the stump with "empty-talons."
A young cottontail caught our attention, him and his little sibling in the grasses. This one had been caught by an animal for his fur was all missing from the back of his neck. He also had the appearance of being severely dehydrated. His bones were showing though his skin and his eyes were sunk in. Maybe he contracted rabies. You just never know what or who you'll meet
while in this valley, but whoever it is, where ever you meet them, there will be a story in their eyes.
As we checked one last time for the cry of a nuthatch on our way home, a deer stepped out into the light fog that had settled on the highway and she bowed her head and gave me a half second to capture the beauty of her face.
We left and when I reached the old barn and windmill that I shot pictures of during last winter's blizzard, I decided to stop and photograph it during a tornado warning.
The weather settled down once we got home.
I'm looking forward to day 152.
See you on the journey--
Lisa
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