Uncle Henry´s Universe.

Monday…

Wednesday…

Friday!

And on the seventh day he rested…

Heard the first skylark yesterday, soon be time to set up the snowmobile for summer storage. 14 plus degrees today made the roads sticky, it’s a terrible time. The snow is still pretty deep in the mountains and I have more golden eagle territory to visit, so I need the snowmobile a few more weeks.

After eight more or less results solve days of field work is it hard with the motivation. To watch with a binoculars, hour after hour, requires a certain purposefulness.

Yes, I have seen some Golden Eagles, but they have either been too young to be sexually mature or old enough but still not inclined to play. Home range is over twenty square km large, so there is a danger that I always can be in the wrong position!

Yesterday however, I got rewarded! Sunshine, some plus degrees and strong breeze gave perfect eagle weather! (The large and relatively heavy birds need help of strong wind or thermals for reviving their play, a kind of Acro – flying)

On site at our oldest Golden eagle home range I barely get up the telescope before the two adult (sexually mature) eagles swept in over the mountain crest. Two dark coloured birds with impressive authority. We have follow them here since 2001, but they have bred in the area longer than that. Over the last 10 years they have come up with 8 fully fledged juveniles.

After a moment of circling at low altitude over pine forest go the eagles down, in top of a tree. They sit for a while in the sunlight and clean the plumage before one of them takes off again and take height. After rising several hundred meters, it suddenly, fold the wings and plunges downward, in a deep dive which shortly thereafter levels out and turns into a rise, followed by a new diving. A clear signal to other eagles that this area is occupied.

After a brief visit to a pine is the eagle back up again. It is mating season, and with its extremely sharp eye may it very well see other eagles playing in adjacent territories, too far away or otherwise hidden for my binoculars.

I could never understand where it came from, but all of a sudden, it’s another bird on the sky. Shortly thereafter, it is three Golden Eagles who tumbles around in a aerial combat! It’s both looping and tight turns before the intruder has been hunted from the area. A breathtaking show! The area eagles got so exhilarated of the event that they both began to play together. Parallel, they performing nine unusually deep dives before they fly down to the top of a rough pine and mate!

Could not be better, the territorial Golden eagles are in place and the ambition to conduct breeding as well. If the spring weather is favourable and no other facts occur, I hope to come back sometime during the month of June with a report on the number of juveniles in the nest. (Last year, they got two strong youngsters)

White snow, Sunshine and a wilderness panorama… The season for inventory of Golden Eagle has begun! I know, it’s an dirty work but someone has to do it

It sounds like a wonderful job to do, and I don’t complain, but hard fact is that eagles are more active when the wind is strong (very strong…) so the day become often horribly cold. To use a binoculars or a telescope hour after hour is also quite demanding.

Today I was searching for a new territory but wasn’t succeed. A lonely subadult eagle was hunting in the area for about 30 minutes, but I never found any adults. But to se a Golden eagle is always nice.

Besides the eagle the day also gave one raven and one bullfinch… Not quite the same quantity of birds that in places like Andalusia or Cuba.

This morning I chased a Moose out of our garden – Again! They wants to be our gardeners but we really disagree. We have a very nice Apple tree (Red Riding Hood) who giving apples to a wonderful red apple-sause that we love to have for Christmas dinner. The bastard now have chopped the poor tree in to small pieces!

More wolves… More wolves… More wolves…

Otherwise, the work today consisted of running out stones for fireplaces in a nature reserv. Better use a snowmobile than to wear them in a backpack in hot summertime.

Some days offer something extra for the trip to work. On this day in early july 2011, I met a moose cow and here two young calves. A nice little family.

On the following day I met also the father , but he was more absent… Only listened with one ear… Somehow…