eagles | sephipiderwitch.com

People often think I was nuts to move so far from work when I bought my home. Granted, it is quite a drive. However, much of it can be very scenic if you get off at the right exit. And the long drive is worth it when you have young eagles taking their maiden flights over your head as you cruise along a country road.

Probably one of the most difficult things about living out here and watching these young sky sentinels is to try not to be too enraptured by them. Unless, of course, you pull over and break out the camera to get some pictures of them. Eagle gazing, I am sure, ranks right up there with texting while driving.

There were a total of 8 of them in the trees over the river when I took these shots. This one, though, was off away from the others. I suppose he/she wanted some alone time. Wasn’t even looking at the river. Maybe he/she wanted some red meat.

This is the Stillquamish River from the bridge on Pioneer Hwy between Silvana and Stanwood. We’ve had a lot of rain this year, so its a bit high. Not as high as a few weeks ago, but still impressive. Maybe that makes the fishing good and why there are so many eagles camped in the trees along its banks.

Yeah, I know, it looks like the other one, but this is on the other side of the river bank.

And this one “Is” looking at the river for some fresh seafood. Maybe they are working together for some surf-n-turf.

One of the youngsters is looking out from the branches of a tree. Its funny how few people see the kiddies. There was a father and son on the bridge that saw all the adults. Didn’t see either of the kids in the trees right next to the bridge.

Even without the white heads and tails, the juveniles are still quite regal and impressive.

And he had absolutely no interest in me at all! I tried very hard to convince him to take off flying, but he just pretended he didn’t hear anything.

Actually, that needs to be corrected. He heard everything except me which just goes to prove that it is not just human youngsters that have selective hearing.

There’s a part of me that wonders if the kids were near the bridge so they could get the easy roadkill lunch from the road. The grownups wanted the fresh salmon though.

Just one more shot, because you can just never get enough looking at these beautiful raptors!

Yeah, they had that whole length of the river covered. You could almost hear them gossiping amongst themselves. “I’m telling you Fred, the one I caught last week was THAT big!! I kid you not! We had to leave half of it for the damned crows. Not that they ever share with us. Greedy little bastards!”

And every once in a while, one of them strikes a pose and looks for all the world like Elmer Fudd doing Scrooge.

Sittin’ in the mornin’ sun
I’ll be sittin’ when the evenin’ comes
Watchin’ the salmon roll in
Then I watch ’em roll away again, yeah
I’m sittin’ on the branch of the bay
Watchin’ the tide roll away, ooo
I’m just sittin’ on the branch of the bay
Wastin’ time

Hey kid? What say we go down the river a bit and see if the farmer left us some leg of lamb?

Sure! There’s too many fishing here to day. They’re scaring them all away.

And the incoming sea gulls came gliding through the air towards the fields below.

And with them, came the other little birds, the doves and the blackbirds, the crows and the swifts. It was gonna be a fun time in the pasture this afternoon.

And they began to find a formation. All except Henry who never seemed able to get with the teamwork motto and always fell away from the pack.

And you thought they were a pop group! (Flock of seagulls, if you didn’t get it)

It seems that they just find the need to all take off every few minutes to a spot about 100 yards in some direction. Yup, all of them at once. I think that may be one of those co-dependency things.

We’ll just call it field hopping. See? They’re doing it again.

Or it could be a strange mating ritual of showing off their gliding technique. Not quite as dramatic as a peacock doing the shake your tailfeathers boogie, but I suppose its better than nothing.