Wish I had my telephoto camera with me......

[Big Muddy]

My son and I were headed to pick up some foodplot fertilizer, and he suddenly threw on his brakes.....he pointed at what looked like a big black blob, about 400 yds. out across an open fresh-cut soybean field a 1/2 mile from our house.....we grabbed the binoculars, and there were 5 grown bald eagles in a big wad, fighting over something on the ground.....it looked like a big swamp rabbit, which prolly got run over with the combine......we watched them for about 20 minutes, until the rabbit was fully consumed.....I've been seeing one around the house fairly frequently, but have never seen this many at once.....beautiful sight.

[Thumper]

Conservation efforts do pay off when done correctly. As a kid, I never saw a bald eagle in the wild ... at least not that I know of. Many times people think they are seeing them, but most of the time, it's an osprey, as they are VERY common here. These days, I see bald eagles all the time. In fact, there's a nest in an old snag in the pasture right next to us. Dang, come to think of it, I should go check to make sure it didn't get blown down by Irma.

I can say the same about alligators. Growing up here, it was RARE to ever see one. You usually had to get waaay out to some back-country lake and shine a spotlight at night to see an eye or two. These days, you can find them in most ANY body of water ... including retention ponds and the occasional swimming pool! We even have an annual gator hunting season now.

[DeputyDog]

It's amazing the comeback eagles are making. There are at least two nesting pairs in the county I live in now. It's not uncommon to see them in the winter eating the fish off the ice that the fishermen have left and also to be eating on roadkill deer carcasses.

It's a really cool sight to see them though. We had one flying over the lake this summer too.


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[quercus alba]

you sure it wasn't a bunch of buzzards fighting over a dead possum?

[BarryBobPosthole]

I don't know where they come frm, Texas probably, but lately I've been seeing black headed buzzards, particlarly around water. And where an old turkey vulture has white all along the trailing edges of their wings, these fuckers have white tips on their wings. I was putzing around on the Arkansas River last week and saw some.

We've have a lot of baldies nesting in Oklahoma now too. There is one that I see circling high over the east side of my town once in a while.

Raptors are cool. There is a northern harrier that hangs around one of the places Birddog and I fish.

BKb

[HideHunter]

I have a "hole" that stays open in the river behind my house. When conditions hit right (usually a shad kill) I'll have dozens.. I've counted as many as 40 mature eagles within a half-mile. 10 years ago we have the first recorded eagles nest in our county in a hundred years.. Now, I could show you a dozen with 5 miles of my house.. Or - can take you down in the bottoms and show you 40 sitting on a field where they dump dead baby pigs from a confinement... glorified buzzards. ;)

[Big Muddy]

Yep, ole Ben Franklin was right.....the wild turkey shoulda been the national bird. ;)

[LJ3]

Telephoto's not a camera. It's a lens. You're welcome. I'll see myself out.

[Big Muddy]

Well, h3ll, I was abbreviating the post title.....pretty sure most folks here understood my meaning. ;)

[airbud7]

Telephoto's not a camera. It's a lens. You're welcome. I'll see myself out.

So my window is not a jar when I crack it a bit?