Hi Tweets,

Libor Michalak writes:

>In another incident I watched a Bald Eagle swooping around over a river
>looking for a meal. After diving for it, the eagle got stuck in the water.
>It too swam using its wings as paddles to the shore of the river.

Couple of summers ago, close to sunset, I watched from the historical marker
and viewpoint on the S side of Point Grey an adult Bald Eagle Haliaeetus
leucocephalus diving repeatedly on a Western Grebe Aechmophorus occidentalis
at Iona Island in Richmond BC. After a final plunge, it simply sat on the
water, then began swimming, paddling with an ungainly butterfly stroke for a
distance of a least half a kilometer over the surface, pausing to rest
occasionally, and bypassing several places where it could have easily
climbed out of the water onto a logboom. It kept up this labored progress
over the water for more than twenty minutes until it decided it had done the
eagle equivalent of enough laps (and scared me half to death--who ya gonna
call when there's an eagle in the drink?) reared back and took off from the
water vertically like a huge dabbler-type duck. Clearly it could have done
so at any time it chose.

Proof was offered the next day when what was presumably the same eagle went
for a dip after some passes at some scoters right off the end of the Iona
South Jetty: just sat on the water, wings outspread like a sunning bird,
floating there for some time. Again, it blasted straight up off the water by
rearing back and giving a couple of mighty beats of those big wings.

Now, is this just an individual who's discovered the fun of total immersion?
I don't think so. I talked to a salmon angler who was out on his boat in the
Gulf Islands and saw a Bald Eagle floating on the water several kilometers
from land, similarly flopping along in that arthritic-looking butterfly
style. What might they be doing? Hard to imagine an eagle doing anything
just for fun, but I can't see any advantage (thermoregulation? sneaking up
on salmon?) to this behavior. Any ideas?

Michael Price A brave world, Sir,
Vancouver BC Canada full of religion, knavery and change;
mprice at mindlink.net we shall shortly see better days.
Aphra Behn (1640-1689)