Mom and Dad Hays are Back — Spring is Coming
My spring time viewing will be centered, as it has in the past four or more years, on a certain couple of bald eagles, affectionately known to me as Mom and Dad Hays.
A familiar group of eagle enthusiasts are already gathering around the tree this amazing pair chose to rebuild their nest in, after the elaborate and enormous nest from prior years went crashing down when the whole tree tipped over and smashed itself during a wind storm.
It has been wonderful to gather around our cups of coffee or tea, some of us from Pittsburgh where the nest is, but more of us from all over the globe who tune in and watch up close the wildest of lives from minute to minute. If I had a dollar for the minutes I’ve spent gazing at the eating, sleeping, mating, egg production, hatching, feeding, and growing going on in a nest with hatchlings, I would be rich enough to commute to Pittsburgh and stand on the trail beneath the tree with photographers and neighbors who have given trail reports of events beyond the camera’s reach.
There is a well monitored chat, clean enough for the eyes of grammar school classes, and fun enough for any family gathering for all ages. And we get educated on survival, the glory and cruelty of it — a reality show that doesn’t try to fool us or shield us from the real lives of very private eagles.
Maybe you readers will be curious. I think I have learned more about the rules of nature from this one activity (worth all the minutes, hours and days watching) than from any book or class.
Right now Mom and Dad Hays are fixing up their quickly built last year’s nest to accommodate a family that will appear as eggs in mid February. They’re “making eggs” in earnest now. And fattening themselves up for this year’s huge project of raising eaglets. Fledged eaglets are called H (n) — the n being the number this pair have had. We are looking for H-8 this year, and maybe more H’s.
SGHolland ©2018
