Me and a good looking Female

[Foxgun Tom]

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooo

[Panache]

Foxgun Tom,

(Panache in best police officer-through-a-megaphone voice)

Put the bird down and step away from our national symbol with your hands up!

Magnificent creature. What is she doing in Brave Scotland?

Cheers

[Foxgun Tom]

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

[beloitpiper]

That is so cool!! And your jacket is really sharp too. Where'd you get that? I assume it can't be found online.

[Foxgun Tom]

00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000

[McMurdo]

Very nice pictures, magnificent bird, thanks so much for posting them.

[Navyguy]

Butiful lass, I wish there were more in nature though, I don't want to change our national bird to something like a pidgoin (there are too many of them)

[wsk]

Butiful lass, I wish there were more in nature though, I don't want to change our national bird to something like a pidgoin (there are too many of them)

There really are quite a lot of them. Several years ago we took a whale-watching day-trip from the north tip of Vancouver Island - didn't see any whales but saw tons of bald eagles. Now that we've got most of the ddt out of the environment they are recovering. But, by no means does that mean that they are out of danger.

My mom is a raptor rehabilitator in New Mexico. There is never a time when she doesn't have a near full house of injured birds. Our built environment is a real struggle for them - power lines, windows fences, automobiles ... She gets birds that have been poisoned, shot, caught in traps. She has a turkey vulture that as a young bird was illegally taken from the nest and fed hamburger. Because of that improper diet the bones became soft and rubbery. Here is a soaring bird that will never fly.

While a lot of the birds mom gets can be returned to the wild, many can't and are euthenized. Those birds that can't be released but are otherwise healthy are kept as educational birds or are givien to Zuni Pueblo where the Zuni keep them for their feathers which they then sell to tribes across the nation for ceremonial use. Better to harvest feathers than to harvest the birds.

Birds the size of Syrup are heavy. That's why Foxgun Tom is supporting his fist with the shillelagh. I just remembered this picture:

This is the turkey vulture I mentioned before - you can see how her left wing droops. I'm holding her fairly close because she'd just finished eating (on the fist) and had taken her time about it; my arm was getting tired and TVs are significantly lighter than Balds.

[Splash_4]

Very nice photos. Just something every well dressed, kilted, man needs on his arm! Gives a new meaning to the expression, a bird on the arm!

[ozmeath]

What an incedible looking animal you've got there Tom. How's the momentum when she goes for the meat on your hand (pref not the eye)?
It's almost like she too real for real life if you know what I mean. Like all the colour and reality is wound up to 11 on the dial. Most envious.