Best Yard Bird Ever

Birders list. Some birders keep lists of every bird they see anywhere and have all sorts of list permutations. I just keep a life list and a yard list: the birds I've seen any time in my life and those I've seen while standing in my yard. Fun but not obsessive.

Yesterday was a beautiful fall day. A cold front had pushed through earlier in the weekend bringing sunshine, cool temperatures, and wind. Sometimes the passage of a cold front and the attendant winds brings birds you might not otherwise see.

Late in the afternoon a neighborhood child knocked on my front door selling candy for his school. Just after the sale was completed, I chanced to look up and noticed a large, dark bird wheeling just above the court in the gusty winds. I thought I saw those unmistakable field marks: dark brown body, white head, white tail. I dashed for my binoculars. When I returned, the bird was just about to sail over the houses behind me. Clapping the bins to my eyes I confirmed those field marks.

A mature bald eagle had just soared over my yard. How about that?
K-