May 11, 2012

Squirrel for lunch? Again?

It's the UW hawk cam. Happening now.

(It was almost precisely this time yesterday that momma hawk flew in with a fresh-killed squirrel.)

27 comments:

Scott M said...

So ALL the cars in Wisconsin are that light metallic blue?

"Birds of prey know they're cool."

Alex said...

MMM tastes like chicken!

Rabel said...

"Look, dead squirrel" is the new "Look, squirrel!"

Been watchin', they had a mouse for breakfast and a sparrow for brunch.

The wind, 20 mph, is giving them a hard time today.

Patrick said...

I watched it earlier today, and they were eating something then too, but I couldn't see what it was.

Hungry little scamps.

Lyle said...

Such a good mommy.

Fprawl said...

Some people call them 'Tree Rats' in Kentucky

Anonymous said...

Aggressive killing for innocence.

An amazing paradox of nature.

Paco Wové said...

All 3 chicks just turned their backs on it! Mom's all like, "WTF!!?"

Curious George said...

Looks like garage is going to have to switch to something else if this keeps up.

sakredkow said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Eric the Fruit Bat said...

One bird's "fresh-killed" is another bird's "agonized."

madAsHell said...

I think your posts are swamping the server!!
Somewhere a sys admin is trying to figure out why the system is being clobbered!

Patrick said...

Looked like one was about to fly the coop a minute ago. Mama Hawk pushed him back into the fold.

Eric said...

The lesson here is "don't park in that lot unless you want rodent parts on your car."

Unknown said...

Darn it. I keep missing the good stuff.

I wish some raptor would clean out our squirrels!

Jay Vogt said...

Now you know why the "Squirrel" is not a very popular mascot for sports teams.

Chip Ahoy said...

HEY, UW HAWK CAM SITE DESIGNERS, you guys are missing a great opportunity over there to disrespect your viewers, your product the video, and the subject under observation. I'm certain you could get Prudential and Blackberry or summat to pay you a couple of bucks each day to reach out there and staple an advertisement or two onto the birdie's little heads. Use a template on their wings to flap around when they're big enough, you silly bastards are wasting valuable ad space -- all those eyeballs.

lemondog said...

Looked like one was about to fly the coop a minute ago. Mama Hawk pushed him back into the fold.

Narrow lwdge. Sent an email to SSEC suggesting some sort of safety net.

re: ads, I've not been seeing any.

lemondog said...

lwdge = ledge.

Triangle Man said...

@Chip

Really, you need to flush your browser cache or something. There haven't been ads for days.

ndspinelli said...

There were penny candies when I was a kid called Squirrels.

pm317 said...

yay! mom porn. This hawk mom is a lot more affectionate than the NYU mom who is not at all hands/beaks on. I like how this WI mom stuffs the two babies under her belly. Never seen the NYU mom do that even when the babies were that small (NYU hawks are a little more grown -- they have black feathers showing up).

lemondog said...

SSEC reply to safety net suggestion is "Nature's Way" :((

Paddy O said...

I'm assuming this is a new squirrel she has for them now.

Very interesting! As were the other cams posted on the thread yesterday. Thanks all!

MadisonMan said...

Last year, one of the chicks did fall of the ledge. Slipped. Didn't kill it, because it was almost ready to fly, and it eventually found its way to a tree.

Made a lot of extra work for the parents. After about 2 or 3 weeks, it was back in the nest.

Capitol Report New Mexico said...

Thanks for the site listing. We passed it around the country. An Eagle site in Iowa is www.farmyou.com/falcon_cams/index.html.

Carnifex said...

Speaking of ads, some enterprising soul could park in the lot with a sign on the roof of the car. As the saying goes "you can't buy advertising like that"

And speaking of squirrels, I was having a bad day deer hunting once several years ago, hadn't seen anything. The sun was up and the day was warming up and I sat in the tree stand watching the squirrels.

They were scampering up and down the oak tree trunks. Burying acorns, then hurrying back up the tree for more. All of a sudden, they all ran towards the boles of the trees, and bear hugged them.

"This is new" I thought to myself, and from off my right a redtailed hawk came swooping through the trees, miraculously not dodging ,but missing every branch, leaf, and twig with nary a twitch of its wings. I sat there awed by the display it made of its mastery of flight. It continued on for about 60 yards and lit on a branch on my left.

All the squirrels were watching too, and the ones the hawk had passed by jumped out on their respective limbs, barking, and flipping their tails as warning to their bretheren.

So there we sat, the hawk on its branch, me on mine, and all the squirrels looking at that big bad squirrel eating machine, and raising as much noise as they could.

A flash out of the corner of my eye caught my attention, so I turned back to my right again...to see a second hawk coming along in the same exact flight path as the first hawk.

Only this one was dodging and dipping, heading from distracted squirrel to distracted squirrel, knocking the off their perches.

It wasn't catching them, it was just knocking them out of the trees, one after another. Squirrels rained down onto the forest floor. The second hawk continued, and eventually passed the first, kept flying until it was about 100 yards away, where it lit. And all the squirrels between the 2 hawks jumped out, faced hawk #2, and started barking and flipping their tails. Hawk #1 took off, and flew from squirrel to squirrel, knocking them off their perches, until it was lost to my sight.

I don't know if the hawks were playing, or were young siblings learning to hunt, but it was the damdest thing to see. I almost fell outta my stand laughing so hard. Never did see a deer though.

Unlike most of my stories, this one is 100% true.