Sunday, June 28, 2015

Piute Log...Nifty Eagle Encounter 2002

12 Oct (Sat)     Craig Randall’s wedding in Minden today at the Carson Valley Inn. Told Craig [one of Bart Cranney’s long-time packers and my friend] that I’d be there. ◦◦◦◦◦ On the drive north from town I saw only two Swainson’s hawks along Highway 395. Fifteen years ago on an October morning you could’ve seen 30 or more sitting atop fence posts and telephone poles between town and the Old Ranger Station (5 miles). They spend a month and more hereabouts fattening up on mice and voles before pressing on to their breeding range down on the pampas of Argentina. But the poor Swainson’s, alas, have been decimated by habitat loss and pesticide poisoning. (Down there, they eat grass-hoppers.) A really dramatic and sad decline. ◦◦◦◦◦ After I rode out yesterday my truck barely started. Checked the maintenance log and found that my battery is 4½ years old  so…time for a new one. (Which, happily, I was able to buy in Gardnerville and not Bridgeport. Nor did I have to find myself stranded out on some obscure dirt road with a dead battery.) ◦◦◦◦◦ My very first “church wedding”…in a generic chapel inside a Nevada casino. The preacher was a large, roundish, balding guy who actually was most impressive-looking in his black robes and red sash. It was an utterly normal, traditional ceremony but quite sweet. We all prayed twice and clapped at the end. Congratulated the happy bride, shook Craig’s hand and cut out not long thereafter. Didn’t even stay for wedding cake (which, I later heard, they both shmeared all over each other’s faces in turn…Gads!) ◦◦◦◦◦ On the drive back, had an amazing encounter. Cruising along the steep hillsides above Topaz Reservoir I spotted the usual small flock of white pelicans gathered on mudflats at the south end. Then, passed a car parked in one of the turnouts  with a woman standing beside it, gazing skyward. I guessed she was watching a circling flight of pelicans so I looked up through my windshield in that general direction just as a bald eagle flew over. ◦◦◦◦◦ Here’s the crazy part: I slowed down to about 45, staring at the eagle when I could, and the big bird stayed in the exact same place overhead (from my point of view, in a fixed spot through the windshield) as I drove through those winding curves. It was trailing me! I could actually see its head cocked, looking straight down on me. I glanced at my speedometer: 42 MPH. (An SUV was right on my tail, its driver ticked-off that I was driving so slowly.) This went on for at least a mile before the bird soared off over the lake to join its mate. It had been maybe 200 feet overhead but we were looking each other right in the eye. A truly magical meeting!

    ©2015 Tim Forsell                                                                                                      29 May 2015