tworiversnwr's Journal

On Saturday March 31st, I almost thought April Fool's came a day early as my companion said she spotted 3 bald eagles in a tree across a field. We hopped out of our car and walked down the refuge trail to get a closer look. Sure enough there were three no wait four! Bald eagles resting in a tree. Two matures and two juvenile eagles kept sharp eyes in the rainy weather. If you go through some of the pictures you'll notice some of their feathers are a little ruffled from the rain. I like to think that after their eggs hatched these past few weeks, these eagles still made time to get together and gossip about the eagles that only winter here. Hopefully these two juveniles will stick around a little while longer too!

This red-eared slider was found sunning itself on one of the first warm days this year. Reptiles are considered to be cold blooded or ectothermic meaning their body temperature is regulated by the temperatures around them. One of the benefits of being ectothermic or cold blooded is that it takes less energy to maintain your body heat, you simply move to somewhere warmer or burrow. 300 million years ago when life first crawled onto land and amphibians and reptiles began to evolve there were no warm blooded or endothermic critters (like us and other mammals). Our turtle and frog friends see no reason to change now!