We had an Eagle showing up at our pond for the last week. It left with what looked to be a gray
squirrel the other day, and got a bass about 15 inches long mid morning out in the deeper part of the pond.

My wife took this shot of it leaving the pond with her cell phone. She said it got something right next to the waters edge and flew off. Gray squirrel maybe.



A couple days ago, it came back and landed on a branch overlooking the pond. We watched it for about 20 minutes, when it flew down and landed on the opposite side of the pond. He slowly stalked up to a hole in the ground about the size of a softball, which was a secondary escape hole for a muskrat den. It almost appeared to be tip-toeing slowly up to the hole.

In the pond, you can see the sandy bottom (*slide) from the muskrats using the den opening just under the water line. The Eagle listened at the escape hole and then slowly stalked to the shore where the muskrat would be coming out. This occurred just as I was running out of shooting light.

Excuse the blur in some of the pics, but I was holding it by hand and zooming in about 100 to 150 feet. We have been here for 3 years and seen all kinds of critters visiting the pond, and have seen the Eagle on quite a few occasions, but I was never able to get some photos until recently. So cool to see this.


We're in Mecosta county Mi.



He flew down from the tree and landed about 15 feet away from
secondary opening of the muskrat den. He slowly stalked to the hole.


Then bent down to listen


Then slowly stalked to the shoreline where the muskrat/s would be coming out of their den.



He left at dark without success, but his actions and a little blood on the shoreline where
he was standing leads me to believe he was successful a day or two before.



The Eagle came back the next afternoon, cleaned up a dead bluegill about 10 inch long or so, then pounced on a mouse or a mole and left. In between the dead bluegill and the mouse, he got a drink of water. Too cool.

You can see the dead bluegill in this pic


Then for a drink from the log my wife and I rolled into the pond for the turtles to bask on. The wood ducks, turtles and now the Eagle all approve.


After the bluegill, he flew to the log and then wiped his beak, first on one side,


And then the other.


Then he surveyed his surroundings for a minute or so,


And then took a drink


Hello


Then pounced on a mole or a mouse.






Cont.......

Then flew back to the nest where I'm assuming there were mouth/s waiting.


In case your wondering what the green stake is, I threw in some pond structure for the fish to
hide in and use late last fall, and thought that I might want to move them, so I tied some nylon
cord to the Pond King brush, shrub, and grass. the brush is about 6 foot tall and the bluegill love hanging out around them. I need to stealth the stake the cords are tied to with a smaller wooden stake,as it's ruining my pics.



I put in 6 of these last fall grouped 3 on one side of the pond fairly close together, and 3 on the other.



Wood ducks are using both of the hatch boxes I put in the adjoining swamp two winters ago.
We've had 4 or 5 pair of them hanging out. We are hoping for a repeat performance as last
year we had three hens that had 18 new additions to their population. One had 8, another had 4, and the other 6. We love watching them in the pond. Every spring, I chase away different pairs of
geese that also love the pond. Too bad they don't play well with others. A quick pic and I'm out the door. "Hey you woodchucks, quit chuckin my wood", said the crazy guy waving a large leaf rake over his head. They get the idea. I get much more respect from them when asking them to leave when
waving a leaf rake. lol





Wood ducks and mallards getting along swimmingly well.


Digging nest.


Mergansers


The Slowskys


Another of the Eagle



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIgpqyrcIkw

Great report!!

Gorgeous






Eagle/HBG

Corgi I think you end up with some very cool pictures. That ones of the blessing a pond will bring (wildlife).

corgi, thanks for your pics. Wonderful to see the critters at your pond. I'm partial to the gobbler.

This am a GBH was wading the pond edge. Two Canada geese landed nearby. Off the deck and into the water went my Australian shepherd. Her philosophy is "Birds have wings; they need to be using them". The interloping geese and heron split before she was halfway out to them. Bye bye pests.

The last BE we had around here (3-4 years ago) did a nice job of cleaning up the stray cat population.

Our group of turkeys exploded this last winter from the normal dozen or two we were used to seeing under the bird
feeders everyday, to over a 100 of them.




Then you should like these two short vids with some turkey action.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXxZ4QEJT9Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2GrsmQSnP4

I wished I could get some good pictures of the wildlife that uses the pond. After dropping a couple of phones in the lake I will usually leave the phone/camera in the side by side or the truck. a couple of years ago as I drove over the hill that looks over the pond I found an B. E. setting atop the wood duck box at the waters edge. It would have made a good picture. Last fall we set up a game camera that over looked the floating pier. We got so many pics of different birds and animals that we shut it down from sending pics to our phones. It was going off every 30 min with new pics of one thing or another. Nice pics Corgi

I use a lanyard on my smartphone after losing 2 flip phones. It goes around my neck and I keep the phone in my chest pocket in an Otterbox. The ring is set to sound like a palliated woodpecker and the notice is set to sound like an owl so it won't scare deer while I am hunting. Only problem is when I think my phone is a real bird, or vice versa:)

too funny, RAH

those are some great pics corgi!

Wow! Great pictures! I'm still stocking right now so I'm not ready for visitors yet, but down the road I'd like to see a BE stop by.