In August of 1985 I sold my house in Kansas, loaded up a rented truck with my possessions, my animals and my son and headed off to Califirnia. This was a seminal point in my life and proved to be a very good move.
One of the things my son has always loved is hawks, eagles and other birds of prey. He looked forward to seeing and getting lots of pictures of the birds as we traveled across the country. We were both aware of the fast disappearing environment for these birds and wanted to see as many as we could in the environment nature had adapted them so well for.
The trip took us to The Grand Canyon , The Petrified Forest and The Painted Desert. We also took side trips to see Native American ruins and reservations. We saw lots of birds of prey along the way to the Golden State.
Once in California, we were lucky enough to live in an area that had many birds of prey, especially red-tailed hawks. Each year we would keep an eye on the mountain behind our house for the pair of red tails who nested on the crest. We were rewarded every year with National Geographic playing out over our heads in the form of young hawks flying with the older hawks for a while and then winging off to establish their own territories.
It was thrilling to watch the hawks as they circled lazily . But the real spectacle came when they would tuck their wings and make the breath taking plummet to the ground, disappear from view, then reappear with a rodent or snake clasped in their talons.
As Los Angeles moved ever closer to our home, most of the wildlife began to disappear. But the hawks were there every year until we moved to Nevada in 2006. Sometimes at night before falling asleep, I think of those hawks and again feel the exhiliration I felt I shared with them as they circled and rode thermals. The absolute freedom of their flying is awe inspiring.
I wrote about this today to let you all know why I love birds of prey and feel it is a special gift to just be able to watch them. I also happened to run across a diary by Lineatus on the Daily Kos web site with the most beautiful pictures of these birds. I wanted to share the beautiful and inspiring photos with my readers.
Go here to see these great shots http://lineatus.dailykos.com/
Just as an after note, our trip was great but the pictures, not so much. My son took pictures as I drove and he would get over anxious to get shots of every bird he saw. So we ended up with a lot of great views of the big mirror on the side of the truck, sun shining through the windshield and some of specks you could almost make out as birds. Ah well, I still have the images in my memory and they will stay there until the day I leave this earth.
