I like eagles. They are a pretty magnificent looking bird. They’re big and pretty darn serious looking. Impressive, yes. But they can also be a bit… clumsy.
It’s not hard to spend time watching eagles these days. Not too many years ago, you would be hard pressed to find one. But they have come back.
As I say, they can often be pretty impressive. I was out fishing one day a week or so ago and caught a small bass. He swallowed the hook and in spite of my best efforts, I figured the fish was likely not going to make it. I decided to let him go and hope for the best. Within just a few seconds I heard this weird whooshing sound behind me. Turning around, I was a bit surprised to see I was correct. My little fish was not long for the world. He was becoming lunch. The whooshing sound was an eagle, slamming on the air brakes to come out of a dive to just brush the top of the water with his talons and grab the fish.
A couple days later, I was again on the water, chatting to a friend when an eagle came and tried to sit in a tree nearby. I said try, because as he came in for a landing the branch bent beneath him. He had to give up on that branch and move to another. One a bit more sturdy and better suited for a bird of his… stature.
My comment was, “Looks like he’s been eating pretty good.”
To which my friend replied, “If you ask those ducks over there, they’d probably say a bit too good.” And yes, the ducks were not thrilled with the fact an eagle was sitting above them. They were not concerned with the fact that he had come close to falling out of a tree, which would be more than a bit embarrassing for an eagle. They were far more concerned with the sharp bits on the end of him.
I have seen other eagle failures. I watched one go after a young loon one day. The loon was not as young as he had hoped and dove just before the eagle struck. The eagle ended up in the water being attacked by one rather upset mother loon. He slowly managed to swim to shore and drag himself up on a rock to dry, but it was not the finest moment in eagledom. And, if you’re wondering, eagles look neither impressive nor majestic while swimming. They also look pretty sad sitting on a rock soaking wet.
While they might try to pull off the image of fearsome birds of prey, which they are, eagles are really just like us. They have good days and bad days. On the bad days, it’s pretty easy to just look like a goof.
