The third morning was a repeat of the second, except the dog was taken out a side door for his morning constitutional, away from the view of the eagle perched, once again, above Freddie and Crystal. Since she had been begging for food from Freddie, we decided to feed her on top of the eagle flight enclosure. Initially, Bill put three rats and a fish on the flight pen at 7:30 A.M., and by 8:00, she was eating, raining little pieces of food down on Freddie as she ravenously made her way through the first meal she had had in some time. By the time she took her last bite, her crop was visibly extended. She wiped off her beak, then joined the other two eagles on the lake, where I assumed she would spend the rest of the day.

I was wrong. At noon, after Bill fed the center's birds, he threw food on the hack board for the hawks we had released that summer and fall that still needed assistance. Thirty minutes later the already well-fed eagle found the hack board and was once again chowing down. She polished off two more large rats in short order, and when she finished she had a crop that bulged so grotesquely, I wondered if she would be able to get herself airborne. She did, and spent the night in a nearby pine stand.

The fourth day was much like the third, although the other two young eagles were gone. The begging eagle, however, was very much in evidence. She was perched on the roof of the eagle enclosure waiting to be fed. She ate several rats and a fish on the eagle flight cage in the morning, and that afternoon cleaned off the hack board before the red-tails we had released at hack could come in and claim the food that up until three days earlier had been exclusively theirs.

By the fifth day, the eagle had learned our morning routine. From her roost spot, she watched me walk the dog and return him to the house. When I came out again to take care of the pigeons, she knew Bill and food were not far behind. While I opened the loft, she began flying over the center at a low altitude, eventually perching above the hack board waiting for Bill. We had begun feeding her only on the hack board because Crystal, the golden eagle, was becoming upset with the young upstart that perched above her head and insistently cried for food. In fact, by the third day, Crystal was clearly fed up. She let loose with one threatening cry, then jumped straight up in the air to nip at the young bird's feet. Of course, there were other ruffled feathers at the center as well when the eagle was around. The kestrels started in with their sharp kee-kee-kees as soon as they spotted her, and the peregrine falcons, whose building sits closest to the hack board added their piercing kak-kak-kaks to the din. DVRC, a usually quiet, peaceful place, resounded with a cacophony of hawk, falcon, eagle, and osprey calls whenever the hungry youngster was nearby.

Two weeks into the eagle's stay, more than just the birds in the flight enclosures were upset. A red-tailed hawk that we were still feeding on the hack board, had also had enough of the youngster that stole "her" food. I watched in amazement as the much smaller, but angrier, red-tail swooped in towards the eagle on the hack board and delivered a passing blow to the back of her head. On another occasion, I watched the red-tail come screaming out of the woods and begin tail chasing the eagle over the center, I had erroneously assumed that the red-tail was faster and more agile in the air than the big lumbering eagle. However, the eagle kept well ahead of the red-tail until it landed on the top of a pine tree. That's when the red-tail finally closed in and delivered another resounding smack to the eagle's head. But this time, the eagle didn't shrug it off. She turned with amazing speed and launched herself after the red-tail which had perched just a few treetops away after delivering her last blow. The red-tail saw the eagle coming and with a startled cry, high-tailed it into the woods. She didn't return to the hack board for three or four days following her dust-up with the eagle.

After the eagle had been at the center for several weeks, I more or less expected to see her flying above my head each morning. Bill, Jan and I no longer wondered if she would be gone the next day, but rather, if she would stay throughout the winter. Our days with the eagle varied little until the 17th of November. On that day, I glanced out the clinic window after the afternoon feeding, and saw double. Where one eagle was usually perched above the hack board, there were suddenly two. One was "our" bird and the other, a two-year old bald eagle. Both birds ate at the hack board and continued to do so until the two-year old left the area two days later.

By December, the eagle's ravenous appetite seemed to have been sated. She was eating several rats and a fish or two daily. Her need for food was no longer as urgent, and it showed in the way she came to the hack board and fed. Initially, she lacked finesse, she perched above the hack board and if it held food she simply dropped down and immediately tucked in. A month later, however, she was practicing flybys - trying to grab her food as she passed over the hack board on the wing. She missed often and would then execute a wingover and come back for another pass, or else she circled the center and tried again on her next circuit over the board. Early on in her "snatch and run" raids, she would grab a rat or fish, only to lose hold of it. When that happened, she landed on the ground and ate the food where it had fallen. Eventually, though, she began getting the hang of it. At first she only carried her food as far as the roof of the osprey flight enclosure where she ate amidst the shrill cries of the unhappy fish hawks beneath her. Later, she carried her food further afield and ate it where I could not see her. She was practicing the fishing skills that would sustain her in the wild. I silently applauded her efforts, but knew she still had a way to go before she could confidently pluck a live fish from a river or lake.

The eagle continued to fly out to the nest platform on the lake and perch there for awhile each day, but by mid-December, I noticed she also spent time perched above the stream behind the clinic. That's when I also noticed the Canada goose swimming in the stream below the curious eagle. The goose had not taken off with the other geese when the lake started freezing over and the reason was painfully obvious. The bird had a broken, dragging wing. Although the eagle was aware of and watched the injured goose, I never saw her attempt to catch it. Bald eagles hunt as well as fish, and one of their favored quarry is injured waterfowl. The young eagle was capable of taking the handicapped goose, but, I suspect her inexperience made her hesitate at taking on prey as large as a Canada goose.

The goose seemed to be safe from the eagle, but, we still had to rescue her and set her wing. Bill put on waders and I lured her to shore with food. She did not leave the water, so Bill dashed in after her. He missed. Even with a broken wing the goose was fast. A few days later we tried again with three people. She evaded us again and actually outran us across the grass to the lake. Needless to say, after two failed attempts, she was leery of us. But, the lake was almost completely frozen over, and it was more important than ever that we catch and treat her. On the third try, I lured her across the ice to the three feet of open water at the lake's edge. Bill was ready in his waders. We were hoping that she would have trouble making her way from the water to the ice and at that point Bill would be able to grab her. There was, however, no awkwardness in the goose's tran sition from water to ice. The only flailing around came from Bill in his clumsy waders in the icy water. The fourth attempt proved to be successful, but only because snowfencing Bill had recently erected prevented the bird from reaching the lake. After a quarter of a mile run, a very winded Bill eventually caught the goose. Three weeks after we had first spotted her, we finally rescued her. In addition to stamina, we also developed a much greater understanding and appreciation of the phrase, "on a wild goose chase."

Meanwhile, during the early weeks of December that we had spent running after a wounded goose, the eagle had spent growing progressively more independent. She no longer came to the hack board for food every day, and there were periods of from one to three days when we did not see her at all. I thought it was most likely that she was flying to the nearby Delaware River and there joining other wintering eagles. By the end of the month we were seeing very little of her, and January 1, 1995 proved to be the last time we saw her. The eagle's departure left a void in my days and for weeks afterwards I still looked for her each morning. Never-the-less, I was pleased that we had played a part in her survival and had gotten her back into condition so that she was better able to endure the rigors of her first winter in the wild.

Post Script - By spring I had stopped looking for the eagle, but often wondered if she had made it through the winter since approximately 75% of raptors die in their first year, many due to starvation over their first winter. On Thursday, March 16, 1995, though, I had my answer. As I was feeding the pigeons at 7:15 A.M., Freddie and Crystal started calling. Both eagles sounding-off meant only one thing, a wild eagle was nearby! I looked skyward in time to see a first year bald eagle fly over the center and land in the tree above the hack board. I ran inside to get Bill. Was it "our" eagle? Bill walked to the hack board with food and the bird did not flush. She calmly watched as he threw a rat onto the board. Bill risked a quick glance upward and caught the telltale glint of blue on the bird's leg. No doubt remained, "our" eagle was back. The next day she was gone, but, returned one week later on March 23rd, leaving again by the following day. I saw her once more on March 30th, exactly one week after her previous visit. As this Journal goes to press I still give a cursory look around the property each morning for the eagle, and while I don't expect to see her, I still look, especially on Thursdays.

PostPost Script - On Friday, April 7th at 6:00 P.M. while Bill was putting birds in their travel cases for a program, he spotted two mature bald eagles flying over the lake. They made continuous passes until one bird finally caught a fish and ate it. As much as Bill and Jan wanted to watch the eagles, they had to get on the road. They left and I returned indoors.

At dusk, about 7:45 P.M., I went outside to make sure the pigeon loft had been closed for the night. I never made it, instead I stood transfixed as I watched the eagles engaged in a mating flight. They wheeled over the lake and swooped around each other . Eventually they met in the air and joined talons. Gracefully they cartwheeled towards the lake, breaking apart just an instant before th ey both lightly kissed the water's surface with their feet. Their aerial courtship continued until it was almost dark, then with powerful broad sweeps of their wings, they circled the lake in tandem and put into a pine tree to roost.

This was the first eagle mating flight l had ever witnessed and it left me breathless. As I walked exhilarated back to the house I thought, we humans have to continue to do everything in our power to save these incredible birds and their habitat, for to lose them would be to lose a collective part of our souls.

Update: Until the fall of 1997, the NY eagle had "stopped by" at the same time each fall for several days and each spring for a day or two since 1994. We know it was her because, first thing in the morning, we discovered her perched in the tree above the hack board and she still allowed our approach to the hack board while we put food out for her. She arrived right on time in the fall of 1997, but accompanied by an adult bald eagle. They perched on the lake and moved from tree to tree for a few hours. Eventually, "our" bird came over to the hack board for the food we had provided as soon as we saw her. But the adult soon followed and repeatedly flew at and harrassed her until she finally flew off with the adult close on her tail. They disappeared over the trees away from the lake and she has not returned since that day. But, you can count on me keeping my eye out for her again this fall.

Each summer veterinarians get phone calls asking them to descent "cute little skunks" or give rabies shots to "darling baby raccoons." The callers want to make the orphaned wild animals they find into family pets just like good ol' Rover. But, cute wild baby animals, no matter how lovingly raised, will still grow up to be what they are suppose to be - wild animals. Remember, it took centuries of domestication to turn a wild dog into a "Rover."

Before writing this story, I spoke with the staff of three local veterinary clinics and found they all receive calls each summer asking for medical or surgical care for orphaned wildlife, as well as advice on how to raise wild baby animals. At each clinic the first thing callers were told is that it is illegal to possess native wild animals - whether to raise them and release them back to the wild or to keep them as pets, the second, that they (the veterinary clinics) cannot and will not work on the animals, but will gladly put the callers in touch with a licensed rehabilitation center.

For some individuals, unaware of the law, being told it is illegal is often enough and they bring the animals to rehabilitation centers. For others, it is the last phone call they will make. Instead, they raise the animals with often disastrous consequences for the wildlife and sometimes themselves. Some animals can be down right nasty. The deceptively laid-back looking opossum has a mouth full of razor sharp teeth that it will not hesitate to use if annoyed. Its bite is painful, but the bite of any animal, even one as small as a squirrel can be agonizing - especially when the animal is frightened or agitated.