We have a Red-Tailed Hawk that lives in our neighborhood. He's a big guy and because he's such a fixture here, I make sure my daughter doesn't take her guinea pig outside. It doesn't take much to imagine what kind of disaster that might bring.Anyway, this morning as I was walking the dogs, the hawk swooped down into my neighbor's yard and snatched up something. Then he perched on the same neighbor's rooftop where he proceeded to eat his morning meal. It reminded me of a situation that befell VOR last year.
She had just put a new roof on her house, a major undertaking. The day after the new roof was complete, she returned home to find a bloody mess smack in the middle of her shiny new roof. Seems the remains of a Hawk's squirrel lunch had been left on her house.
Around Florida, our abundant wildlife can leave quite a mess, but hey, that's just part of life in the Sunshine State. Like the time my friend Glyn decided to spend a sunny Saturday on his boat only to find that the Osprey who lived nearby had left the remains of a big, yummy crab lunch on his boat's roof. The crab remains stank to high heaven and he spent an hour or more scrubbing the crustacean off his roof before he could get underway.
Beloved and I once took a motorcycle ride out to a local outdoor cafe. I use the term "cafe" loosely, as it was really more like a fish camp with a few tables set up outside. It was a beautiful day and we were sitting at the outdoor picnic table, watching the manatees swim in the canal, and enjoying our friend green tomatoes when all of a sudden, INCOMING!!! A group of pelicans came swooping over us and let loose. Anyone who's ever been the victim of a pelican bombing can attest that these big, prehistoric looking birds can do some damage. Luckily we got away with just a little splatter and our food escaped untainted.
Ah, the joys of Florida living!
5 comments:
Nice hawk shot! My wife's family has a camp (cabin) out in the Gulf and every spring it is coated with the poop of countless seabirds.
Nice shot. We have 2 fully adult and 2 young eagles nearby. One of the youngsters dropped a still-alive snake that landed on a golf cart. Not sure if that was a prank or an accident.
Can't take credit for the photo. Flickr. Hawk's delivering live snakes . . . sounds like something a Disney flick would have one of its characters do. Too funny.
We have two families of Hawk's in our horse pasture. Your thoughts about the guinea pig reminded me of a friend's kids. They had just gotten a rabbit as a pet and wanted to take it outside on its leash. My friend heard a hawk approaching and snatched up the rabbit just in time. Oh, how his kids would have been tramautized.
After nature christened my new roof. the bloody carass continued to bake in the sun as no one was the least bit interested in climbing up to remove it. The smell finally went away and I forgot all about it until one day, as we were pulling into the garage, something came rolling down the roof and with a "Whump," bounced off the hood of my car. Yep-squirrel skull.
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