The Eagle and the Raven

Sitting by the side of open water in a large wetland waiting – hopefully – for ducks to arrive, I glanced skyward. What I saw wasn’t a flight of waterfowl, but instead it was an adult bald eagle slowly soaring extremely high in the cloudy gray sky.

It made a couple of lazy circles as I watched and then, suddenly, a common raven approached the eagle from above and behind – the placement favored by pilots of fighter aircraft. Apparently birds had figured that out millions of years before aircraft were developed.

The eagle made one more slow loop before it drifted toward the southwest – with the raven in pursuit.

The raven made repeated passes at the eagle, although I couldn’t tell whether it ever ever made contact with the larger bird.

Twice, when the raven got too near, the eagle began to roll over to extend its talons towards its pursuer – 

 

When the eagle began to roll over a second time, the raven applied its brakes to avoid getting too close to the sharp talons –

But the raven overshot the eagle, putting the eagle in an advantageous position to the rear of the raven –

Ravens are more maneuverable than eagles and very intelligent. They seen to enjoy what can only be called playing in the wind, doing barrel rolls and loop the loops, carrying objects as they fly then dropping them and catching them as they fall – and harassing large predatory birds.

The birds continued in a southwesterly direction, gradually losing altitude – the raven still pestering the eagle –

Until they were lost against the wooded background.

Rainy Spring Morning

The day before had been beautiful, cool, with a clear blue sky and a few white clouds sailing across that blue sky – but it was extremely windy, windy enough to keep birds in dense cover. It was early enough in the spring that wildflowers are barely above ground, much less in bloom.

So my walk in the Big Woods was short and, other than for a bit of exercise, unproductive. I spent most of the afternoon sorting through old slides of the family from the 1970s; the best will be digitized, but most went in the trash.

On this morning the sky was gray with a light mist falling but no wind. Out I went to walk several old roads that pass through brushy areas and past several small wetlands.

I hadn’t gone too far when atop a staghorn sumac there was a robin plucking fruit. We all think of robins picking earthworms from lawns, but they also eat a lot of fruit when other food is scarce. Sumac isn’t a favored food, but in late winter when most other fruit has already been eaten robins will avidly feed on sumac.

This robin ate one small fruit after another, bending down to select one, plucking it from among all the others and often tossing it in the air before swallowing the fruit –

The robin finally flew off and I walked on, soon coming to a large pond circled by a shrubby wetland. On the far side there was something white; the telephoto lens revealed it to be a great egret –

Also on the pond was a pair of Canada geese. One goose swam back into the wetland while the other lay its head down on the water in an effort to hide. That didn’t work too well –

In a nearby tree a male red-winged blackbird called frequently as it moved from branch to branch –

As you can see in some of the photos, the drizzle had changed to rain and my hat and jacket were soaking through, so I headed back.

Mystery of the Injured Buck

In November 2013 an injured white-tailed buck appeared on one of my camera traps above the house –

He was fully mature, at least two and a half years old and probably three and a half. His distinctive non-typical antlers with the little extra point on what is called the G2 tine are very distinctive.

The buck’s upper left leg or shoulder was injured: maybe from a hunter’s bullet or arrow, or perhaps he’d been hit by a vehicle, or fallen in one of the rocky areas up on the hill, or was injured in a fight with another buck, or …

He appeared on camera again in January 2014, making three appearances, two in still photos and once in a video clip –

In the video it was rather obvious that he couldn’t put weight on the leg and he dragged it as he limped along.

Then he disappeared and we thought he was gone – did he succumb to his injury, did infection set in, did the eastern coyotes or free-ranging dogs that roam the hills bring him down, maybe the snow and cold of winter ended his life.

But then – in February 2015 there he was again, in a photo from a camera trap. This time he’d already shed his antlers, but the way he held his left leg and what appeared to be a healed wound on the inside of the same leg made it apparent that the injured buck was back.

He was gone through spring, summer and most of the fall of 2015 until he showed up in a camera trap photo once again in early November –

This time his antlers had more bulk but they weren’t symmetrical and they still had those odd little extraneous tines.

After that one photo he was gone again – shot by a hunter, eaten by a carnivore, …?

March 2016 came and so did the injured buck. Once again he’d shed his antlers; and he was still favoring that left front leg. Even in a still photo from the camera trap it was obvious that the buck was dragging the leg –

We hadn’t actually seen the buck, we only knew he was visiting from his camera trap appearances and infrequent tracks in the snow.

The buck was gone again, having survived far longer than we thought he would. Although white-tailed deer are tough critters and he’s not the first severely injured deer I’ve seen, his was a really debilitating injury.

No show throughout the rest of 2016, or 2017, or 18, or 19, 20, 21, 22, or 23.

And then came December 2024 and there was the same injured buck in a daylight video from a camera trap right behind the house. He had no antlers having either shed them early or failed to have grown antlers. But he was still dragging that leg –

Where was he for those eight years? It’s well known that white-tail bucks wander quite widely during the rut as they search for receptive does. After the rut bucks return to their home range where they spend the spring, summer and early fall. 

This buck may well spend those months elsewhere and only come our way occasionally during the rut, does that account for those eight years?

Our property adjoins thousands of acres of public and private woodland, much of which is seldom visited by a human.

Was he ever successful in breeding during any of the years after he was first injured? Look closely at the photo from November 2015 and you’ll see that the tip of the small extra tine on his right antler appears to have been broken off in a fight with another buck. Did he win the doe or was he driven off?

But the ultimate question is how did he survive all those years? The cold and snow of winter; predation by dogs, eastern coyotes and black bears; hunters; starvation; and exhaustion from the rigors of the rut can all cause the demise of any injured deer and yet this injured buck survived.

Many more questions than answers.

It’s Spring

In our front flower bed there are several clumps of light blue crocus that, at our place on the hill, are the first flowers to bloom each spring  –

 

These crocus had been in my grandparents’ garden as long as I remember; more than 35 years ago we moved a few of  to our garden. There they’ve slowly multiplied and spread a bit so we now have several separate clumps. These crocus are apparently a heritage variety and they bloom earlier than any of the newer more colorful varieties that are commonly planted.

These early crocus were in bloom for a few days until the bright sunny day a bit over a week ago when the first bees of the year showed up to gather pollen.

There weren’t many bees for, although it was a sunny day, it was fairly cool and quite breezy. A few bees buzzed around the flowers, loaded up with pollen and then flew off. For a while they were all gone, then suddenly three or four reappeared to, once again, load up with pollen –

 

Again they disappeared for a while, then returned. That coming and going continued until the temperature began dropping toward the end of the day. But, each sunny day for the next few months they'll be back, not just for crocus pollen, but for pollen from whatever flowers are in bloom.