Eagle Journal

Hello everyone,

I noticed in the last few days that Widow has changed her hunting tactics. This is what young birds do — if they are not having great success with one hunting strategy, they’ll look for another. Widow’s only exposure to hunting is trying to catch jacks off my fist, exploding off the fist at close range.

Female golden eagles are at a slight disadvantage hunting in this way. Not being quite as quick as the males they require a little more time to build up speed. Widow, coming around in condition, is now selecting jack rabbits that are farther out. She still cases the close ones, mainly because she can’t help herself, but it’s the longer running jacks that are interesting her.

I walked into the large alfalfa hay field and immediately noticed that Widow’s body language had changed. She was standing very erect on the fist and looking much farther out into the field. A good third of the field is flooded with irrigation water, which means that the jacks will be more concentrated in the dry part. I started to coarse the field back and forth trying not to miss any areas. A jack jumped up in front of us and ran straight for the flooded section. Widow didn’t even give it a glance. She was focused on something moving off to the left. Widow launched, flew roughly 30 yards and landed. I didn’t see anything but assumed it was a jack. I turned and went right down the middle of the field. Widow nearly caught a jack ten feet in front of me. But despite chasing this close one her attentions were still on the rabbits way out, so I stood for a moment and let her survey the field.

I could see jacks sneaking out on all sides of the field and running down the dirt road. Coming to the end of the field, I was just about to turn and go back the other way when a jack flushed, headed right for the railroad tracks and the star thistle covered bank with Widow closing fast from behind! The jack disappeared in the weeds just milliseconds ahead of Widow.

That was a serious flight! At least 4 more times she left the fist and flew after a jack only to pull up and land and then walk back to me, hop back on the fist, and continue to look out into the field. It appeared to me that she was testing this new hunting technique, testing how much effort was involved, and testing what the jack rabbits would do. With each flight she was getting closer and closer and I could see her indecision as she flew. She would fly hard and fast, then back off some, look like she was thinking about landing, then hit the jets again, only to land a short ways further on. To me it is clear that Widow is trying to find her way……a way of hunting that is best suited for her.

With the heat climbing and dripping with sweat, I thought I’d make one last swing through the field. About half way across the hay field Widow stood as tall as she could on my fist, looking out in front of me. I could see a pair of jack rabbit ears moving from left to right 25 yards out. Widow launched somewhat casually but with intent, and quickly started to build speed. She flew into the very slight breeze using it for lift and turned in the direction of the now freaked out jack rabbit. Like a runaway freight train Widow continued to build speed and easily flew down the speedy rabbit, catching a large male (6.5lbs!) 85 yards out. Nice flight!

If this is going to be Widow’s way of hunting we are in for an exciting summer because when eagles hunt this way there is no bottom end to how much speed they can build up and the flights are spectacular.

Hope all is well,

Joe