Eagle Harassment

Not a very good photo, but I found it very interesting to see 3 sea gulls mobbing a Bald Eagle.

Gulls are stupid.

I like this image - this kind of situation are very rare to see and almost impossible to catch (on film or digitally). The post-processing was a little bit over-kill in my opinion - the birds seem oversharpened just a tiny bit to me ...
Keep them comming !

Yeah Scott... keep 'em coming!

Not stupid, Scott. They're just bullies when they can go 3 against 1.

And speaking of mobbing, I saw a couple of little sparrow-like birds chasing after a hawk. I think there were about 3 or 4 little birds mobbing the hawk when it invaded their nesting space. When the hawk left their space, the little birds ended the chase except for one who was still on the hawk's tail. I thought that was funny seeing a little bird chasing the bigger hawk. What if the hawk had turned around and saw the bird was all alone?

Nice capture Scott,, they usually move around so much its hard even to watch

JZ

Just curious.... were they really mobbing the eagle or were the little scavengers cruising for some left overs?

Did you see movie Nemo? The gulls were always screaming "mine!" "mine!" .... it was pretty funny.

I'd say they were mobbing. Heck, that poor eagle never even went *near* the food.

The funny thing is that the gulls didn't mind the ospreys so much, but when the eagles flew overhead they all flew away - giving us several minutes of quiet. But this time he got mobbed.

ROFLMAO! Every time I spot some gulls I say that, over and over again. "Mine! Mine! Mine!"

I get some weird looks at the beach...

Around where I work (Commencement Bay, Puget Sound-Tacoma) The seagulls go nuts everytime an eagle flies overhead. The strange thing is it is not usually the gulls that harrass the eagle but crows. The crows are brutal and will not give the eagle an inch. Stength in numbers I guess. At least this was the explanation from the raptor experts at the local zoo.

Nice capture Scott. I often see small birds harassing turkey vultures, but I've never seen this. If those gulls only knew what they were dealing with...

Gulls are fun to just sit and watch though, they're like the psych ward of the bird realm. Their behaviour always makes me smile... especially when they're in groups.