Eagle efficiency

I see eagles here on Birch Lake, not all the time but often enough to know we have a resident pair. There is one kind of occasion on which I'm almost guaranteed a close look.

When fishing, I try not to damage what I catch. When a bobber goes down I strike quickly, ignoring the advice my father gave when I was a kid -- to "let him take it for a while." That might have been appropriate back when we kept and ate most of what we caught, but it's a poor practice if catching and releasing, as it means fish get hooked deep in the throat.

By setting the hook right away, you mostly lip-hook the fish and can release them without harm. If by chance a fish manages to swallow the hook, the best course is to leave the hook in place and cut the line. The fish swims off and in time the hook works loose. But then there are the borderline cases, when it looks as if I could slip the hook out with my needlenose pliers, but I overestimate my surgical skills, and I injure a fish.

My favorite spot is a rock bar about 100 yards out from an undeveloped (because wet) stretch of shoreline, backed by heavy woods that include white pines where eagles perch. Suppose I unhook, and injure, an undersize walleye. Before long the fish will flounder on the surface, not far from the boat. Then it's just a matter of waiting, and not very long. It always seems to happen when I am looking in the opposite direction.

Suddenly behind and from above me there's a whish, whish, whish, whish...I turn just in time to see an eagle deftly dip its bright-yellow talons into the water, fly off with the fish, and carry it up and away into the trees. It happened just the other evening, the eagle touching the water no more than 20 feet to the shoreward side of the boat.

The efficiency is quite amazing -- it's almost as if the eagles watch me from a treetop in expectation. I hope their attention is not a comment on my poor catch-and-release hygiene. Their swoop-and-snatch is beautiful to see but is no excuse for letting oneself be a slob fisherman.