We came upon this scene on a Seattle area beach . . . a small stretch of private community beach where we have a pass.
Planted on the pebbles, way far away, too far for my 70-300mm lens, we watched as this Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) wrangled with a second eagle, a group of crows, and a vortex of gulls overhead, all looking for a freebie from the eagle’s fish.
The bird intruders annoyed the eagle enough that it took off with its fish. Gulls grabbed what was left until the second eagle, waiting in a nearby tree, swooped in and flushed the gulls, then grabbed the remaining chunk.
The fish pictured here was long dead, in spite of the implied movement of the first few shots. The eagle was moving the fish to another spot when we showed up.
Fish – ©ingridtaylar
Finding a Spot – ©ingridtaylar
Soaked to the Jodhpurs – ©ingridtaylar
Wingspan – ©ingridtaylar
Dining – ©ingridtaylar
2nd Eagle Looking On – ©ingridtaylar
More Dining – ©ingridtaylar
Braveheart the Crow, Wants Some More – ©ingridtaylar
Had Enough – ©ingridtaylar
Takeoff with Fish – ©ingridtaylar
Gull, flying behind eagle, grabs a dropped remnant – ©ingridtaylar
Gulls and Fish Chunk – ©ingridtaylar
Something\’s in the Air – ©ingridtaylar
Eagle #2 En Route – ©ingridtaylar
#2 Snagging the Leftovers – ©ingridtaylar
Wow wow wow! LOVE these pix and that intrepid crow and especially the dancing gulls of Something’s in the Air. Wow!!! Also LOVED the diving and dining cormorant (brown?) in the prior post. You have gifts, Ingrid.
Thank you, Elizabeth! I love it when you stop by and grace me with a visit from home turf California! It’s funny you mention the gulls: there are so many gulls here — and crows. They’re obviously not exotic, and some people see them as mundane. But it gives me a lot of time to watch and observe. And I have a new Seattle motto as a result: If all the gulls, crows and pigeons suddenly flush into the air, an eagle is en route. That seems to be the pattern. I always look up for the inevitable Bald Eagle fly-by. That’s a big change.