Sunday Jan. 29
On the west side of Lake Runnemede by the pump house, the two wounded Canada geese were out on the ice. A common merganser swam close by. Then one of the geese got into the water and swam too.The one on the ice was focussed entirely on grooming/attending to/ pulling at its broken wing which was hanging limply and looked very "threadbare" to me. I started to walk towards State St. and just a littleways on saw part of a goose's wing which had a break in it to the left of the path. A little ways beyond two dark feathers. I don't know if this came from one of those geese or some previous goose but I hadn'tseen it the last time I came by nearly two weeks ago. I felt sad about those geese! There is a lot more open water for them now, but no chance of a rescue by VINS unless the lake freezes over completely or theyare on solid ground.
Then, walking up the hill to State St. a mature bald eagle flew off a tree over the lake while another one stayed, perched near. It mostly focussed on the lake but looked back a few times at us too. Anotherperson had joined me, Ann Roy, with her scope and camera. Ann said that she had seen ice fishermen throwing out fish scraps for the eagles (not right then) and she thought that was why the eagles were sointently focussed on some ice fishermen still out off the gazebo. We viewed and discussed the geese and merganser, then the eagles.
Cecelia Blair