Egads! A Bit of Eagle Excitement!!

Holy crap!! I've been feeding this pair of ravens that lives in my neighborhood for a little over a year now. This winter, I mostly have been walking the 20' or so from my house to the end of my drive way where there is a hulking snow bank and putting food out there. The 'ususal' are these all natural dog bisquits shaped like a heart, old bread and I indulge them almost daily with a raw egg for each. The ravens take turns sitting out on that bank looking at me through my front window where I am ususally at work (or playing on this computer) and basically reminding me that they are there and would like, "more food please." No matter how much I have already put out for them. When they are sitting there in a pouring rain or thick snow shoulders hunched up, they are at their most pathetic and I think they know it.

So, this morning I remembered I had a chicken carcass from a rotisserie chicken I bought last week. Yesterday, I gave the ravens and my dog Sarah most of the easily accesssible meat from the bones. This morning I figured they would most likely grab the bones and fly off with them, so I didn't worry about them leaving a mess of bones at the end of my drive.

Well, it can't take more than 20 seconds or so to walk from my door straight out to the end of the drive. One raven was there, on snow bank doing his begging/lookout. I walked out there tossed the carcass onto the snowbank about three feet from the raven and I was about three feet from the carcass. I noted Thing 2 (the other raven) start down right away on its usual spiral to join its mate. But then at the same time I heard them give out an alarming cry, different from their usual vocalizing. I looked up and saw the reason why. A bald eagle (and yes, they are quite large) was about ten feet above the carcass, its knobby orange claws set out for a quick grab and run. It all happened so fast and right in front of me. It was awesome!!

We have had a pair of eagle that lives in the neighborhood and has been here for at least 20 years. So it is not unusual to see an eagle. It is unusual for them to swoop down and grab raven food. The thing that is really so remarkable is the short amount of time between me leaving the house with the tasty treat and the time it took the eagle to see what it was and intercept it. It somehow KNEW there was a Chicken carcass for lunch and not the raven cookies. And bam! There it was. Afterall they are predators with great eye sight and probably a keen sense of smell. If they were slow at getting the job done, I suppose they would have died out with the dinosaurs. WoW.