First Time I’ve Seen This Happen

I was walking the pup at lunchtime today. The wind was howling and snow was blowing, but the Labrador doesn’t care. About a mile into the walk, I caught a movement out of the corner of my left eye. I glanced up – expecting a magpie. Instead, I saw a robin sized grey, black and white bird flying – with a little difficulty – close to the ground. The bird passed in front of me about 20 feet (6 meters) away. It was flying about chest high (to me) so I was able to get a really good look at it. As it passed, I realized that I was seeing a Northern Shrike and it was carrying a small, short-tailed rodent in its beak. It was probably a vole.

It flew off about 100 meters before I lost sight of it. I would have loved to see it do the rest of its “process” for eating its prey. I have read about Shrikes and seen dozens of them over the years, but I have never seen one carrying, or storing its prey.

Anyway- it was a good day to be walking right where I was, and a bad day to be that vole.