Letting Go

Incubation is more than stillness and silence, but an anticipation of flight, fraught for me with both pleasure and anxiety. Before the eaglets even hatch, I project my worries, fretting that as fledglings the young birds will fall off a limb to the ground where a coyote might scent them out. Before my first year of observation, I had no idea that a graceful adult begins as a clumsy fledgling that totters as it balances on a branch that bounces like a slackline under the weight of an adult-sized juvenile with a reluctance to let go and fly. When I found out, the process of egg to fledgling scared me just that much more. I forgot how much I worry until I started watching again this year, my third year.

The first year, I saw the moment of what I think was first flight for the fledglings. For me, the occasion was a “National Geographic moment.” I held my breath as the juveniles flew, not with grace but with enough ability and strength to support themselves in the air. I only released my breath when they came to rest on a branch. I wanted them to fly without risk, but that wasn’t possible.

This is my third year watching the eagles. I feel the excitement of the brooding adult more now that I’ve seen the entire cycle, and I know that someday I will see those eggs break into hatchlings that in the best of all worlds will later fly. And, this year I might see them next year as subadults, knowing they survived, knowing their first attempts at flight succeeded.

Below, I've included a photo of the antelope jaw fragments I wrote about last week. Also, I’ll be on vacation next week, but will be back the following Wednesday.