Monday, July 24, 2017
Hawks in gutter
Biking through my neighborhood something heavy lifts from out of a gutter where water has gathered and not drained off. Two hawks heavily beat their wings to rise up wet into the trees.
"Did I just see that?" I wonder.
Today, five days later I am biking on the same street, same place, same gutter, and something sloshes in the water. A hawk. I stop my bike. The hawk stops bathing and regards me. I move a bit closer. Never having been so close to a hawk like this I am eager to see all I can, but I don't want to be impolite. The hawk doesn't seem to care. It is happy in the gutter. It dances a little. I stare.
"How strange." This hawk must think. "Why does this man visit me every time I have my bath?"
4 comments:
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You have amazing adventures in the urban wild.
ReplyDeleteHowever, a few weeks ago I did see a doe run through all the front yards across the street from me, then run back the other direction. And once in a while, when the wind is just right, I might hear wolves at the zoo. But never up close and personal, like watching a hawk at its ablutions. Wow!
Well a doe is pretty nice! But yes, that hawk thing was mysterious. There was a guy in the next yard over just, I don't know, weeding or something while the hawk bathed. All normal.
ReplyDeleteComo? I've heard those wolves. Hate zoos, but it's a powerful sound eh?
Powerful, indeed. I am not a big fan of zoos, but Como is free and when I ride the #3 bus across Como, I see that lots of families who probably can't afford anything else, visit the zoo. And the kids get to see animals, maybe learn to care about them?
ReplyDeleteAt one time I would sometimes hear loons on Lake Como. It's been years. This year I haven't even spotted any ducklings or goslings.
Fair enough on the free point. I am haunted by a vision of going to como a long time ago and seeing a polar bear, pacing his small enclosure with an obsessive madness, while the sign read "Polar Bears roam up to a hundred miles a day."
DeleteOuch.
I saw a lot of very cute baby ducks on Minnehaha creek in the spring, but now, come to think of it, since then not a great deal of waterfowl have I seen either!