Fine dining

An immature bald eagle just flew over the house with a squirrel in its meat hooks. It landed in a tree a couple hundred feet away. Now there are two adult eagles trying to get his meal away from him. And just now another immature eagle landed in another tree. Its not unusual to see an eagle or two here with the river behind us but a whole family unit is rare. It must be some fining eating as that youngster ain’t having any of this sharing his meal stuff.

The lucky bird has finished his breakfast and just flew off taking mom, pop and his sibling with him. Its a fun watching nature at work.

That is very cool!

I love watching this kind of stuff, we watched a huge mature eagle eating road kill deer a little while ago from about 50 yards away. Something magical watching that eagle do its work

I am fortunate to see them daily on my commute to work. Sometimes just perched on top of the tree and other times enjoying a hearty meal !

Knowing bald eagles, it just may have picked the squirrel off the road – dead.

Bald Eagles have the reputation of snatching fish out of the water, but I see them all the time eating carrion. Last fall prairie chicken hunting you could see a dead doe out 60 yards in a corn field. There were three bald eagles, a dozen or more black vultures, and countless crows …

We captured a great photo of a group of vultures lined up in a row nearby on the roof top of an abandoned old house.

We live on the Mn River bluffs and have a nice Leica spotting scope set up. Years ago there was a red tailed hawk perched about 15′ up on an oak at the egde of our hill. I didn’t know he was even there until he spread his wings and simply hopped off the limb he was on and kind of “parachuted” down. I lost sight of him for a second and then he reappeared and flew back up the the limb. He had a field mouse in this talons. I watched through the scope as he de-skinned the little critter with his beak…it was like watching a gifted surgeon. He discarded the skin and had a nice lunch…it was like watching a nuture documentary in 4K. Lots of baldies down here too. Mom and pop really hate it when I hike under their nests this time of year! Never been pooped on but wouldn’t surprise me.

Yes, Bald Eagles get something like 80% of their food from scavenging or stealing the kill of other birds. While they’re capable of snatching a live fish, usually the fish they’re grabbing are already dead or injured. I can’t remember where I heard it (maybe a MeatEater podcast when they had a non-fiction history writer on) – but many Native American tribes found it very fitting that the colonizers chose the eagle as their symbol as they knew it primarily as a bird who steals for it own benefit.