The only sound that could be heard in the forest was the sound of the waves crashing on the ocean shore nearby. Then that stillness was broken by a hollow clicking noise. The noise had a pattern and it was clearly a bird. A crow or a raven. I have a hard time telling them apart. Crows usually make a caw! caw! sound while raven have a deeper "throatier" sound.
I stepped up on a ledge beneath a hemlock tree, where its roots grew thick and gnarled.
The birds clacked clacked, it's hard to describe the sound but it sounded like when you tap on a live microphone.
Then suddenly!
Woe!
There was an eagle perched on a branch with two crows!
I could hardly believe my eyes and began to fumble with my camera, looking for my lens. I swear I was so excited my hands were shaking, and all I kept thinking was those birds are going to fly away, and I'll have nothing to show for it, but the memories. I also began snapping with the phone cam.
The threesome remained perched on the branch. One of the crows was making sounds towards the eagle, who simply stood there listening. The calls sounded complex. Non-threatening. Soothing almost. Then curiously, the other crow came up and touched the eagle's beak with its own beak and began to "kiss" it.
I kid you not.
Scandalous!
What was going on up on those bushes? Maybe Disney was right all along and wild animals are friends, after all.
At one point, the crows began to caw and then took off. The eagle remained in place. A little while later, one of the crows came back and perched itself behind the eagle. It began to make the popping sounds and ruffled the eagle's tail feathers with its beak. I captured this exact moment in the following shot.
The other crow came back, so that branch sure got busier and noisier.
Is this normal behavior? Eagles and crows can peacefully coexist in interspecies bliss? I often see crows attacking eagles during the nesting months. I had no clue that they could actually be "friends" and spend the weekend just hanging out.
