A big thrill for me last week was to see my first bald eagle sighting on the Wood River. I know that others had reported seeing an eagle in this area in previous years, but I had never positively ID'd one myself.
It happened Friday morning when Danielle was givening me a ride to the WPWA campus from Hope Valley. As we drove up Arcadia Road, I saw a very large, dark bird with white head and tail flying over one of the fields. Realizing that it was not one of the usually turkey vultures we normally see in this area, I had Danielle drive down Skunk Hill Road and back down Rt. 3 until we (meaning Danielle with her eagle eye sight) spotted the bird sitting on a tree leaning over the west side of Wyoming Pond. We were able to drive up one the back roads and have a great look at the eagle, just sitting calmly watching the river. There was no doubt about it being an adult bald eagle. Of interest to me were the crows flying nearby and landing unperturbed near this very large avian predator. After allowing us to take a few pictures, the eagle spread its wings and majestically flew up river again.
When I got into the office I looked information on the ASRI website. Several people had reported recent sightings of bald eagles all over the state. Thanks to conservation measures taken to protect large bird predators, such as banning DDT, it is now not unusual for eagles to winter in areas like RI where there is plenty of open water for fishing. (Photo by Danielle Aube)
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3 comments:
This is awesome. Have you seen eagles in other locations along the river.
PA
Danielle, Thanks for posting this! We were seeing immature Bald eagles this October in the Matanuck Hills (as we often do in the fall). But they seemed to be hanging around for longer than usual. I had quite a few close encounters, and learned that when they drop out of a tree to take flight, their big ungainly wings sound just like a canvas coat being shaken out. A mature one showed up, in early-November, and stayed through Christmas and into the early part of January. Once the ponds were frozen solid I didn't see them anymore. The mature one, was spotted on Worden's Pond for about a week in Dec. feeding on the carcass of an otter - don't know if the eagle had something to do with the death of the otter or was just enjoying the meal! It's so cool to see a bird like this returning. I wonder how they will interact with the ospreys.
My daugher and I saw a bald eagle this past thursday, February 26th, and words can't express the feelings we had watching this; and it was majestically flying over us in PAWTUCKET, RHODE ISLAND ...
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