A man’s gotta eat and so does his family. Unfortunately for us, our favorite furry critters can be easy targets for those birds that decide to make a home near an urban environment. It’s notoriously rumored that many nests that belong to birds of prey are littered with many different collars from cats and smaller dogs. It’s no question that these birds are absolute killers… assassins of the sky.
Eagles in particular are crazy good at hunting. They have vision far better than humans and it’s said that what we can see at 5 feet away they see the same at 20 feet. They also see in UV meaning any trace an animal leaves is easily picked up and draws them in. Yup, that means your yard covered in dog piss is a clear target these birds are keeping an eagle eye on.
The funny thing about this particular video is that it involves a housecat. Cats are known to cause more bird deaths in North America than any other cause by far. Seriously, they kill millions of birds a year.
So, if we think its cute when our pet lands on the front step, proud of his kill, it’s hard to be to upset when something comes after it, isn’t it? I mean, I get it… they are pets… there is a difference. But we need be realistic about what goes on out in the wild.
These eagles here are shown with one parent and two chicks in a nest. It’s a common research tool and its often live-streamed to watch an eagle’s nest. Lots of cool stuff can be captured, just like this instance right here. The mature eagle in the nest looks back and another flies in and lands in the nest.
At first it’s hard to tell what, but this Florida bald eagle brought home dinner. After we get the slo-mo replay you can see that it has a house cat that is done for in the nest… all you can really make out is the head.
According to the author of the video, this eagle’s name is Harriet:
“Harriet flies in to the nest with roadkill cat (head and foot). She most likely picked it up from the side of the road after the cat had an unfortunate run in with a car and brought it to the nest as prey for the E’s.
Eagles are opportunistic hunters, nothing is wasted in nature. It may be difficult to see the cat head on the nest and some viewers may want to limit their watching until it is disposed of one way or another. Poor kitty…”
A reminder for cat owners… keep your kitties close if you have any birds of prey around.
