[scook]

The eagles around here have had an amazing recovery since the effects of DDT have diminished. They’re all over the place.

My wife and I were as the beach a couple Christmases ago and found some kind of sea bird fouled in one of those little crab traps you cast with a fishing pole. We cut it loose and had it wrapped in a coat, since it was obviously injured, made a call to the wildlife rescue folks and waited, and waited for a response. The bird was getting a little rambunctious (clearly not appreciating what we were doing for it) and finally it was obvious we needed to turn it loose. It took off hobbling (like Festus from the old Gums one show), just got to the water and an Eagle nailed it. Of course then we heard back from the wildlife lady, told her the story and she said “ oh well, merry Christmas Eagle”. Not so funny for the injured bird, but the eagle didn’t waste any of it - we found the carcass coming back and it was picked clean.