Friday a woman I work with-see her every 2 weeks-said a week earlier she had been biking with her daughters by the Ashokan Reservoir near here. She wondered if I had been there to see the Bald Eagle nest yet. I hadn't heard about it because there's really no good birder network here. The rock climbers know where the pefa scrape is because their trail is closed, but they don't share. The professional photographers know because they've been camped there, but they don't share. Heaven forbid someone ELSE gets THE shot! It's really strange. Anyway...
She said the people she spoke to said the eaglets were 5 weeks old. So I decided to head that way this morning since they should be starting serious wingercizing about now.
As I walked out onto the road
I saw what appeared to be 2 eagles in flight. Didn't even have my camera turned on yet...I lost them before I got this shot. There was not a single soul other than me looking for eagles. I stopped a walker and she said the nest was over there...that tall clump of pines...or maybe that one...she wasn't sure...
I scouted every branch and didn't see a thing. Then I caught a quick glimpse of a dark bird with a left primary missing fly into the area of the right arrow. My first instinct said eagle.
Maximum zoom of where the bird went. Maybe there's a dark pile of sticks left lower quadrant.
Like any good bird watcher, patience is the key...and it was pretty out there today...
Finally saw a bird take off from there...
I followed it with binoculars off to the east. It looked like the other one I had seen but not missing a feather. It was definitely a juvie bald eagle. It flew below the level of the walkway and I was able to see the back & head feathers clearly.
There are at least 2 fully flighted juvies so they're at least 12 weeks old. Either my co-worker forgot when she was there or the photographers gave her bad info. In any case, I saw what I went to see!
