May 9, 2018
Salish Sea, Pacific Northwest
Sometimes there are just those days when it seems like everybody’s in the neighborhood — the sky neighborhood in this case. I’d seen my FOY (first of year) osprey the day before and was hoping it was still around. The day was mixed sun and clouds, with a brisk westerly wind over the bay.
Even before I got down to the bay from my house a quarter mile inland, I saw a repeat of an encounter from the day before as I headed down the road: a crow divebombing a raven. I’d heard the wuf wuf of the raven’s wings, but didn’t get a good look at them that day. This time I could see the raven’s shape and hear the crow calling, so there was no question. Perhaps the raven was getting too close to a nest.
They were a ways off, and moving fast, so my pics aren’t great, but you can see the crow come tearing out of the pine tree, dive at the raven and pull up on the other side.
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The crow flew up, settled on a tree branch and the raven kept going around the corner, flapping slowly as they do, acting almost oblivious to the noisy attack. I can never tell whether the bigger birds are seriously preying on a nest or whether they are just taunting the smaller birds. This area has a mix of trees, shrubs, fields and wetland, hence lots of nesting habitat. Throughout this season blackbirds and crows especially are out attacking vultures, hawks, eagles, and ravens who fly in too close. It doesn’t seem to matter how big the perceived threat is.
So, that was pretty cool to watch. Every time I go out I hope to see something interesting going on in nature; I could have turned around and gone home after that!
But the beach beckoned. I was “escorted” onto the beach by a turkey vulture flying low. A month ago the vultures returned from their winter home and I see them daily now, from a few to as many as 8 at a time, soaring and circling, scanning the fields, roadsides and beaches for carrion. This day was no exception.
Emerging onto the beach, big sky opens up. This day it was unsettled, with layers of swirly clouds and gusting wind. The sea surface was ruffled with light chop. Most of the vultures were pretty high up. Gulls too.
Once at the beach, I could hear an osprey calling, that utterly distinctive hair-raising chirp. Looked up toward the sound — and there it was, flying low, scanning the shallow water along the beach. After a few passes it swooped up into a tree, watching from up there.
Movement off to the left — could it be the osprey’s mate? — then a big bird lifted off from the water. Osprey pairs have high mate fidelity (60-70% according to a study cited in Birds of North America) and both will return from migration — but separately. Females depart south for coastal Central America in late summer, a month before the males and juveniles, and then spend the winter in a more southerly location than their mates. In spring, males usually return first, to claim their old nest or start building a new one. Females arrive some days (or weeks) later. They haven’t seen each other since the previous summer.
If she’s very late, her mate may hook up with a new partner, and then feathers fly; usually the old partner will drive away the new one, but under protest. If one of the pair doesn’t show up at all, the lone remaining bird may not breed successfully. From Birds of North America (where most of this osprey info comes from, birdsna.org/...) :
In cases where one bird does not return to a nest, the surviving individual (male or female) may witness a scrum of candidates trying to fill the vacancy. Often the dispute may last long enough that no young are raised. Males in one such situation were seen to eject eggs from the nest shortly after the female laid them.
I’ve seen pairs of ospreys in this bay in some previous years but not all. That doesn’t mean two aren’t around though, since once incubation begins the female stays on the nest while the male hunts food to bring to her, and for the chicks once they hatch. I don’t know where the local ospreys nest. Ospreys seem to prefer to nesting on artificial structures, and raise young more successfully on such nest sites, but there are no appealing structures like that in the rural area where I live. Likely there’s a suitable treetop on private waterfront property I can’t see from public beaches.
But the calling from this new bird wasn't osprey. It was an even bigger bird who was also hunting over the bay.
An adult bald eagle winged up and away, carrying a good- size fish. Eagles around here eat more ducks and bunnies and roadkill than fish, so this was a treat to see.
While I was watching the eagle flying off with its fish I heard a splash. The osprey had dived straight into the water below.
You can see how much glare there is on the surface, and that’s shifting glare, as the wind roughs up the surface and waves roll in. Very difficult to see past the surface to fish below. Eagles and osprey have fantastic vision. The osprey successfully snagged a big fish too.
Raven, vulture, osprey, eagle — these are our biggest sky birds in the Salish Sea. Awesome to see them all on one afternoon outing. That’s rare.
Watching these glorious masters of the sky reminds me of some lines in an old poem, which was written not about birds at all, but which beautifully evokes them to me.
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along.
- from High Flight, by John Gillespie Magee Jr., 1941
What do you feel when you look up at the dynamic sky, and watch the birds at home there?
What’s up in your natural neighborhood today?
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