It turns out
that hawks do hunt in their nesting area.
I had read the opposite point of view during my research on what to
expect from the pair of raptors that have taken up residence in one of our oak
trees. And I was beginning to believe
that we might be in for a perpetual state of peace in our little neck of the
woods based on the fact that, to date, no acts of hawk-versus-anything violence
had occurred on or near our property.
Then the
weekend came, and Mars was eyewitness to two events that indicated our area was
changing from a pre-reptile Garden of Eden into British Philosopher Thomas
Hobbes’ “State of Nature”, wherein life is “nasty, brutish and short”.
Saturday
morning I went to work on our community rose garden with some members of my
men’s garden club. Mars lingered at home,
and then took the two-mile walk to the site of my labors from which we
rode home together.
She didn’t
mention anything in the Jeep but after we de-embarked in our driveway she
walked quickly over to our other vehicle, a red PT Cruiser, and told me to look
at the roof and tell her what I saw.
This being the pollen season, a coat of fine, yellow powdery stuff
covered the surface, and I was expecting to see the outlines of cat’s paws –
but instead I was greeted by what looked to be the aftermath of frenetic
attempts to randomly brush away microscopic grains of male procreationary
desire.
I said nothing
and must have looked perplexed because Mars quickly said, “The hawk!”
“The hawk?”
“The
hawk! I was reading the paper and
noticed him sitting on top of the bird feeder stand, looking down at the
flowers in the flowerbed below. As I got
up and moved closer to the door I saw a squirrel scurry out from the Rudbeckia
patch and dart under the car.
“The hawk
quickly followed after him and tried to land on the roof – but he kept sliding
and flapping and slipping until he gave up and flew back up to the nest.”
“Wow!” was the
best I could come up with as I looked around at our – at the moment –
totally squirrel-free landscape. The
tree rodents did however return later in the day.
On Sunday
morning Mars went downstairs and opened the front door for our early morning
hawk-check. She stepped out to get a
glimpse of the aerie, but nothing was happening. Then, as she was turning away and closing the
outer storm door, she sensed movement in her periphery vision and looked up to
see the hawk gliding across the lawn at about her eye level, again in full
pursuit of one of our gray bushy-tailed yard pets.
Still
unsuccessful the hunter peeled back like a fighter jet and returned once again
empty-taloned to his home.
A family
friend “K”, who is an eagle observer for a local wildlife organization, had
forewarned us “Squirrels might be safe until the chick or chicks are hatched,
then all bets are off. Food is food, what ever is the easiest to catch or
prey upon. Nature is always a lot closer than you or I think it is.”
Even though we
haven’t glimpsed them, I guess the wee hawklets have seen the light – and they
are hungry
It’s not bad enough
that their parents appropriated the squirrel’s main residence for their home in
the suburbs – now the hawks are trying to serve these former tenants as the main
course on what once was the tree rat's dinner table.
Nasty, brutish
and short indeed – but also, to my chagrin, pretty, darn entertaining.
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