Today's Lesson: Don't Eff With Golden Eagles

Look at that cute eagle playing in the grass with his friend Mr. Fox.

The University of Minnesota has a bad ass mascot. You wouldn't realize that until you learn a little about the Golden Eagle though. I saw one of these videos a while back and had to figure out the deal. Here are a few fun little facts about my favorite bird of prey which is also called a raptor. Raptors have large and strong beaks and talons designed to pierce and tear apart flesh. Golden Eagles have an average wing span of over 7 feet. They are an "avian apex predator" meaning a healthy adult male is not preyed on by any other animal. Their talons are strong enough to crush human bones. They prey on rabbits, turtles, foxes, other birds, and even young deer, lambs, and small goats. Yea you read that right, deer, lambs, and goats, whoa.

These things are no friggin joke. They even get married and stay with the same spouse for their entire life. Every one of them is already a survivor, literally. Each year the female lays two black eggs and sits on those vicious warrior spawn for 45 days. After they hatch, they spend 50 days in the crib while the mother hunts, brings back food, and tosses it to the two chicks. When those 50 days are up, only one bird emerges from the shelter to attempt flight and learn to eat on its own. The survivor was the chick that won the majority of the squabbles for food and grew big and strong while the other chick dies before it ever leaves the the cove. This system also serves as a backup plan if one of the chicks dies shortly after birth, the other one gets all the food and grows up.

Oh yea, over the last 10 years bird crime rates have fallen in major European and American forests but many canyons and other high altitudes in Central America do still suffer from significant eagle crime. Golden Eagles can and will kill other birds of prey, even if they are much larger than the eagle itself, if the offending bird tries to steal the GE's groceries or trespass on its mountain. In extreme cases some starving birds of prey will even break into a Golden Eagle's family cave to search for baby GE's that resemble field mice and eat them as a snack. Those cases of birdnapping and eagle-snacking are somewhat common in eagle neighborhoods where the mice population recently declined. Raptors are highly addicted to field mice and will act irrationally when they go from readily available to unavailable. Golden Eagles usually do not get sent to Eagle Jail (the state pen-nest-tentiary) in this case or even get their talons removed (as long as they can afford a wise Owl to act as their lawyer) because murder in self defense or food defense is socially acceptable in the animal kingdom. Especially if it involves two birds and a beaking and entering. The only other issues these days with GE's have been hate crimes against deer. Eagles and Deer is a rivalry that is as older than Cats and Dogs. Golden Eagles have been known to drag deer off cliffs after arguing about politics (Deer are very liberal). Two more fun facts, eagles absolutely love the taste of venison, and also the creator of the popular video game Buck Hunter was actually an eagle from Texas.

OK look, I got way too carried away with that last paragraph but the first two are 100% facts. I didn't plan on doing that I just was joking and couldn't stop. If it was funny then cool, if you hated it then I hope your dog gets stolen by an eagle. Check these videos out though. They are the stars of this post, just wow.