Sunday, October 10, 2010

The Tower of London and a Death in Golden

yesterday i saw a raven with a mouse in its beak. i knew they were smart birds, but I didn't realize they ate anything other than garbage and carrion. My recent visit to london, and seeing the huge ravens at the Tower has given me a new appreciation for the birds. It was very interesting.
it struck me that several times in recent months I've seen a bird doing something that I found interesting or funny.
the first was a hawk in golden that struck a mocking bird. it landed right in front of my car with the white striped wing of the mocker still flapping. it's mate was extremely distressed and kept flying from power line to power line and making a fantastic racket. the hawk, meanwhile, paid no attention to the noise and sat there, subduing his dying prey.
then, a few days later I saw a huge bird of prey, perhaps an osprey (i've tried to identify it on Colorado div of wildlife websites to no avail) hop off a short post he was perched on and start bouncing along the ground toward a colony of prairie dogs. I thought this was extremely smart of the raptor, as approaching by ground gave it a better chance of catching one of the burrowers unaware since they usually have a couple lookouts that stand up at the entrance to their tunnels and watch for airborne predators.
Then I saw a robin pull a worm out of the ground. But the worm was so long that the robin toppled over backwards when the meal finally came free. it was a little funny.
my time in colorado has started to engender a greater appreciation for wildlife--and more specifically, the personalities of wildlife-if you can call it that--but the way they behave and sometimes do things that are funny, or unexpected etc.

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