Male roosting near 208th Avenue this morning SEPT 30

[NewMexiKen]

Mary Lou and I stopped by a little after 9:30 AM this morning and searched around the nest area to no avail. The electric company workers had moved to the east, near the corner of 208th Avenue. We gave up and made the U-turn at 209th. As we passed by the workers, one of them signalled to me and pointed up at a dead tree about 50 yards from the corner on the south side of Pines.

It was the male! as Al noted a bit earlier, it had been watching the work all that time.



This reminds me of the Middle School experiment, when the students collected data about the location of the adults during several time periods. They compared heavy traffic (high disturbance) times to low traffic (less disturbance) times. Although their sample was too small to be statistically significant, they found that the eagles were closer to the nest during times of most disturbance, which did not agree with their hypothesis that the disturbance should scare them away. They suggested that perhaps the birds reacted differently because they were more apt to protect the nest at times when there was a lot of noise and traffic. Eagle watchers may remember that workmen that had to excavate the area in front of the nest made the same observation, that the eagles seemed to be watching them.

Earlier we encountered several deer in the wetlands SE of the nest, along SW 196th Avenue just south of Pembroke Road. First we saw a buck that had only one antler, but it was too dark for photos. Then we encountered a group of four does along the road. High water conditions in the Everglades may be forcing the deer to seek higher ground for foraging.

It was still quite dark, so this picture did not come out very well, but I liked their pose. We think that the darker and slightly larger deer may be the mother of the three, which could be yearlings.