This is a quick post about an adventure of sorts Laura and I experienced just last week. We ran into town during a snowfall and on the way back to our home, visited a local hemlock forest as well as spotted some bald eagles perched alongside a field. What was initially a somewhat boring chore-filled day somehow transformed itself into isolated moments about which to write. This is why it’s always important to bring along a camera, wherever you’re off to. If I didn’t have my camera with me during this short trip, I surely would have regretted it.
We’ve been experiencing an odd February. Storm after storm is forecast, yet all we receive is one to two inches each snowfall. I’m not disappointed in the least because the less snow that falls, the less snow I have to clear from our sidewalk and driveway. What’s lovely about each snowfall though is the fact that it’s extraordinarily light and fluffy. And apparently, due to the lack of wind during each “storm,” the snow has been clinging to the branches of the trees, making for a picturesque landscape.
Our first adventure took us to Bonney Woods, a small forest that’s part of the more expansive Powder House Hill trail system of Farmington. As we made our way from Farmington on Anson Street, we noticed how beautiful the snow looked on the trees. We decided to pull over to walk some of the trails.
While I won’t bore you with too many photos, I’ll post a few to give you an idea of how similar the forest would be to Narnia. I’ll tell you though, we took our lives in our own hands while walking these trails as there was a solid and very slippery ice base just beneath the shallow layer of snow.
We really only remained in the forest for about 15 minutes due to the treacherous terrain. Any longer and we certainly would have perished. But as if the wonderful scenery wasn’t enough, as Laura and I continued to make our way back home, we noticed a cat walking through the snow across a field. And as we were watching the cat walk, we noticed three huge birds flying above. We were startled by the size of the birds and were even more startled as we discovered they were bald eagles. While we definitely saw three, I suspect there were four. It was tough to view the entire scene while I was driving.
Any time a person finds the opportunity to watch bald eagles fly above is a magical moment. Any time a person watches those bald eagles land about fifty feet above them is just plain crazy. That’s what occurred in our case. As we were driving along, we saw three eagles land in some roadside trees. We pulled over to photograph them. While the picture at the top of this post is definitely the best, the following illustrate how incredible these birds look when so nearby. Damn those branches.
What’s interesting is that at least one of these birds is banded with what seems to be a gold band. I did a bit of digging on banded bald eagles in Maine and found an informative website. I learned that, first, bald eagles can live for up to 25 to 30 years, and second, those who were gold banded originated in Massachusetts between the years of 1987-2006. There’s a chance that this band may be orange and in that case, it was banded by the same people (Andrew Vitz & Jennifer Longsdorf) between 2007-today. I find this extremely interesting. You tell me. Is this band gold or orange?
The website I visited offers the bird bander’s email addresses and a method of reporting sightings, so I might just send a few emails and a photo off to see what I get back. How exciting!
UPDATE
I submitted the information to the contacts I mentioned above and received this response:
Thank you for reaching out and informing MassWildlife of this observation. This burnt orange color band indicates this is a Massachusetts banded bird. The photo is just barely too far/unclear to be able to read the band number with complete confidence. It appears to be two numbers over B (XX/B), and if I had to guess, I would say 42/B (see screenshot, attached). If it is 42/B (federal band number 0709-02193), then this bird was originally banded on 5/31/2018 at the Quabbin Reservoir in New Salem, MA. 42/B does not have any siblings and MassWildlife has not been made aware of any other observations of this bird. I have updated our database accordingly with this observation with a note that the ID is not confirmed.
We also encourage you to report this observation and submit the band information to the Bird Banding Lab run by the USGS as they manage all bird banding data throughout the country in a single database. You can report your observation online at: https://www.pwrc.usgs.gov/BBL/bblretrv/.
What an interesting find. What’s even more interesting is that one of the eagles we saw came from Massachusetts. And now he or she has a new life in Maine.
I reported this bird to the federal website that was suggested to me. The website indicated that they receive thousands of submissions per year, so this one is admittedly a drop in the bucket. But hey, it’s something fun to be involved with.
