Monday, March 28, 2011

Snake snack

   Out for a walk on a Sunday afternoon, getting away from my work, I hoof along the crosstown trail, looking for woodpeckers, hawks, or maybe, if I'm lucky, a deer or fox.    And then right there, not twenty feet to my left, sits a fine red tailed hawk, sitting on the ground of all places. But then I see he has just caught a snake, the blood still bright on the brown leaves leftover from last fall.  The hawk pulls the snake apart and eats away, looking at me rather disdainfully I think.  But then I get my photos home and load them on my computer and there, in the larger image, is what seems like a pained expression on this hawk's face.  As if he is chagrined to be caught eating a snake.  There's no shame in that, though.  You take your protein where you can get it.  And the alternative is what, more rodents?

 

No comments:

Post a Comment