Aerial Acrobats
I saw two birds doing amazing stunts in the air. I thought they were turkey vultures. Vultures were soaring in the same area, and the only eagles I’d seen that day were far away. I should have known that I was not observing vulture behavior. It was only when I got to my desk and looked at the photos on my monitor that I realized they were bald eagles.
The two eagles put on a bravura performance. I don’t know if this was part of a mating ritual. The bald eagle mating ritual involves the two birds locking talons and cartwheeling toward the ground. Perhaps, after the final image below, they locked talons. I couldn’t see if they did. They weren’t in danger of hitting the ground or the trees in the foreground. They were out past a bluff above the Mississippi River and hundreds of feet above the water.
After watching this video starting at the 3:15 mark, I decided that it was an adult eagle playing with a juvenile (do eagles play?).
