Let the Eagles Soar

Collaboration at Conowingo!

I’ve always aspired to be more of a fox than a hedgehog.

Those who know me well are not surprised. I have a fox tattooed on my arm! But it wasn’t until later that I discovered the adage of Archilochus: a fox knows many things, but a hedgehog knows one big thing.

Perhaps that makes foxes shallow and flighty; they certainly seem so if you meet one. Sometimes it feels that way, when I flit from one thing to another. Why don’t I obsess and master this or that? I’ve never really been interested in one thing. Whenever I was offered two choices, my response was can I try a bit of both? I told my friend Hannah this as we walked towards Conowingo Dam to watch the bald eagles, black vultures, cormorants, and gulls feed in the artificial chop. “Who can order a soft serve ice cream cone, and not get the twist? I just don’t get those people.”

My mother was into astrology when I was younger and told me I was a Gemini, and it stuck. (That’s my scientific way of explaining why I hew to the stereotype of my star sign.)

For example, birding. When we arrived at the dam, the pros had already set up. Dozens of people in puffy down coats and windbreakers, with enormous lenses on their cameras, mounted on tripods, with a second camera for following close. I showed up with binoculars, a decent all-around set of Nikon field glasses, my GoPro on its obnoxious selfie stick, and my phone. Hannah has a nice DSLR rig with a decent lens, and I was envious. Take a look at her post about our trip, and see the fantastic photos she took! Then come back and look at my crap, out of pity:

Writing in the vernacular

We lucked out with the weather and got a clear, if cold day. We’d planned on the day before, but it rained all day, and luckily it had all cleared up by the time we arrived. And the birds were ready to make up for lost time! We saw fights and bickering and fun. For me, the vultures were just as interesting as the eagles. The cormorants are always enjoyable to watch dive, and see where they’ll surface. Vultures get love too:

We also walked down an old rail bed trail that followed the river. We didn’t see too much, except for a pair of squabbling shrews that looked like little brown velvet beanbags full of squeak and indignation. We interrupted their breakfast on the old rail, and they scarpered before we could snap any photos. I thought they were voles, but Hannah looked them up, and they were shrews.

My videos weren’t very good, as the GoPro is a wide angle camera, but here are the highlights from from my footage:

Here’s a gallery of my phone photos, of eagles and vultures and cormorants, oh my:

Conowingo Dam Gallery

Afterwards, we stopped by the Susquehanna Inn for a refreshing repast of a pretzel and fries… smothered in pounds of cheesy crab dip. It’s a Maryland thing, and I love it. The Inn is supposedly built with wood from the old wooden dam, and has some history to it. It’s a hangout for the bikers who come to see the eagles. Our server, who might have been a “hon” if this was Baltimore, was great to talk to. She started there a few years ago when the place still had a rep for being rough, but now the bikers are chill birdwatchers, it seems. The joint is known for pit beef (local barbecue) during summer months, and I hope to return to check it out. If you go, call first. They didn’t fire up the pit this year. Here’s hoping they will soon.

And because I can’t leave without a poop joke, here are two for the holiday season!

First, I stopped in Port Deposit, a historic little burg not far away; there’s a place called the Union Hotel where they cosplay as colonials and serve joints of beef. And there’s a public terlet by the marina, which is great if your bladder is sloshing thanks to a tumbler of coffee. “I made a deposit at Port Deposit!” tee-shirts should be for sale. And lastly, there were signs at the Dam warning us that vultures can cause damage to vehicles. Much like my incorrect vole observation, I assumed this was due to them shitting on your car:

Two seconds of Googling later, and the answer is revealed, but the mystery is not! Apparently, vultures like to tear up the vinyl trim and windshield wipers off cars. They don’t eat it, and no one knows why they do it. But they do it often enough that there are warnings. Thankfully, the vultures neither shat upon nor pecked apart our vehicles.

This won’t be my final post of the year, but they will slow down. Worry not! I plan on attending the official return of Lucy the Elephant at Margate, and I will report on the festivities. The old pachyderm has undergone a multimillion dollar restoration, and I wouldn’t miss it for the world.

So, are you a fox or a hedgehog? Or a shrew or an elephant? Please explain in the comments.