When the eagle became one of America’s national symbols more than 200 years ago, it was partly because they are strong birds who live a long time. It was also because these beautiful birds seem to float, a great symbol for America, who had just fought  for and gotten its freedom.

OK, now, I’m not sure why I opened with the history lesson. Maybe it was because Ann and I went to a couple of eagle watches in Old Lyme and Southbury, respectively. On Saturday, we were in Old Lyme, where we observed, her with a camera and me with binoculars, baby black hawks soaring quite high over our heads. Oftimes, it was hard to see the little guys clearly because they were up so high but when we did, despite being  babies they were beautiful birds, I when they got close enough to us.

However, Sunday’s presentation in Southbury at the Shepaug Valley Eagle Observatory was even more appealing to me. Here’s why: the presentation showed us a beautiful, now adult eagle named Aurora(shown above) that had injured one of its wings-I don’t recall which one- when she was young. As a result ,her ability to fly was limited to flapping her wings a couple of times and then settling back down atop this woman’s forearm or hand which were covered, obviously, with seemingly thick rubber gloves while she told her story. I think that this was my favorite part of that whole presentation. Seeing the size of this beautiful bird up close was neat. We got there bit too late to find out how Aurora injured her wing.Though I already gave Aurora top honors for the show that we saw yesterday, another, even bigger bird, a turkey, that we saw right after Aurora named Niblet was a close second. What caught my eyes with Niblet were the beautiful colors, beautiful collage of red running down her neck, not to mention a wide range of bright colors beaming from her seemingly tiny head.

It’s amazing what people become interested in or find fascinating that they thought that they might ever be interested in their lives. For me, this is one of those examples and have I Ann to thank for getting me interested because I never initiated either one of these ideas. Thanks again, dear.