BBC Snippets

Link: http://www.freelists.org/archives/bristol-birds/01-2008/msg00091.html

Feb. 23, 1991. BBC President Ken Hale planned and provided leadership for the club's first annual winter Golden Eagle field trip to Burke's Garden. Such caravans of birders going there from bird clubs were scare if nonexistent 20 years ago. He guided the trips for years.

BBC birders were well aware of the large numbers of Golden Eagles wintering throughout the Clinch Mountain range of Russell and Tazewell counties in Southwest Virginia.

Lilly's Trading Post in Washington County at the intersection of Rich Valley Rd. (Va. Rt. 700) and US 19 had a mounted Golden Eagle displayed above the store shelves when we were there Oct. 22, 1964. Harry Jessee, an employee, told Wallace Coffey that in the 1930's he had trapped 12 to 15 of the birds in the area of Elk Garden in Russell County. At that time he lived in Lebanon. Harry's father was at the store that day and said the bird on display had come from Elk Garden.

Ken Hale had much experience with Golden Eagles and Bald Eagles along Clinch Mountain, and Burke's Garden. He wrote many field notes about his observations and, on one occasion with Rick Phillips, they watched a Golden Eagle in almost free fall into the road at Tumbling Creek to kill a Groundhog. With a spotting scope, they watched it enjoy a leisurely meal.

Ken was a wildlife management graduate from Tennessee Tech University and the wildlife manager area supervisor at Tumbling Creek and Laurel Bed Lake. He had banded a Golden Eagle in the area. Coffey had banded one at Roan Mountain, NC. Golden Eagles were high on the watch list.

The BBC had carefully compiled and compared results of eight Christmas counts across the region. It had not escaped BBC that Sarah Cromer and the Clinch Valley Bird Club at Tazewell had reported one or two Golden Eagles nearly every year for at least six years during the period 1983-1989. Sarah told us they were mostly coming from Burke's Garden as were the Rough-legged Hawks. They had seen Golden Eagles there for years.


Early on BBC carefully mapped all of the sites various species were frequenting in the valley.

From the early mapping efforts two of the most exciting finds during those years turned out to be owls. Dr. Fred Alsop spotted a Short-eared Owl near the Gose Mill pond on March 10, 1991. The BBC plucked a dead Long-eared Owl from a fence, Jan. 27, 1996. Ken Hale retrieved that bird and was determined to be an after the hatching year male. A careful search of that vicinity along Back Road for another bird at a roost site never found another Long-eared.

On Saturday morning, Feb. 23, 1991, BBC set out for what would be two decades of annual winter pilgrimages to Burke's Garden. That first trip stopped at Abingdon and Hansonville to meet other birders who wanted to join in. In the next few years, birders came from across Tennessee and Virginia and from neighboring North Carolina to join the search for eagles.

Over the following years, bird clubs from the Carolinas, Virginia, West Virginia, Southwest Virginia and Tennessee made trips there with their clubs to see the eagles. A group from Knoxville had planned a visit for late this month.

Of all the great memories of birding in Burke's Garden, came on one great day when many birders were standing in the middle of Back Road not far from the rock walled cemetery. Suddenly, someone shouted look coming here. Straight down the road from about a hundred yards away, there were three big raptors flying right at us. They were not more than 50 to a hundred feet above the road. They kept coming straight on. One Bald Eagle, one Golden Eagle, one Rough-legged Hawk -- all flying in formation side by side at the same height and right at us. Without a cue, all of the birders let down their binoculars and began to cheer as they floated right above us, passing light three fighters planes flying over the Super Bowl. the birders began to cheer and whistle and then a nice round of applause as they drifted beyond.

Ann and Grady McRae were there from the Bibbee Nature Club at Bluefield, WVA. Birders didn't forgot the look on their faces at the great showing of enthusiasm. They had never seen birders behave like that. Few have since.

On Feb. 16 the Bristol Bird Club goes again for its 18th consecutive winter Golden Eagle and Rough-legged Hawk trip to Burke's Garden. Everyone is invited to join in. You always have been !

From the archives of the Bristol Bird Club.