Where Eagles
SOAR,
you find delight
I
BY
DAVID HELMS
Photography by Dr. Terry Wood
t’s simple.The first time you see a bald eagle flying in the wild you just never forget the sighting. The average bald eagle has a body length of 28 to 40 inches and a typical wingspan is between six and seven and a half feet. An adult eagle’s average weight is 10 to 14 pounds. The bald eagle is America’s national bird and we’ve all grown up seeing photographs of them. But when you see an eagle soaring overhead the sight of that magnificent bird just explodes the senses of the soul. An adult bald eagle is mainly brown, but it’s their white head and white tail that tattoos that image into your memory bank for life. In God’s sunlight an eagle’s head and tail shine like 5,000-lumen LED light bulbs. The first time I saw the pair of eagles who have nested for almost 11 years now at Trace State Park in eastern Pontotoc County was in December of 2010. I had just walked off of no. 2 green at Pontotoc Country Club when I looked out over Trace Lake and saw them circling high above the water. I put my golf game on pause for about 15 minutes as I watched the eagles put on an air-show. They made flying seem as effortless as breathing in and out. Only an occasional wing flap was needed to maintain their circling pattern as they scanned the water below. Then suddenly they flew for the opposite shoreline, covering several hundred yards in a matter of seconds. Welcome Home to Pontotoc
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