In one of the most provocative spectacles nature has ever offered, a pair of bald eagles adopt and feed a baby hawk. This bizarre event has left birders in Canada completely baffled, as hawks are usually a source of food for huge birds. In fact, this is how the baby hawk got into the eagle’s nest in the first place. The baby hawk was supposed to be food for the little eaglets, but against all odds, it’s now thriving after the bald eagle family adopted it. He even acts like a bald eagle. From now on, the baby red-tailed hawk apparently lives in perfect harmony with his adoptive parents and three eaglet brothers.
“It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen in the world of birds of prey,” David Bird of the Hancock Wildlife Foundation told the Vancouver Sun. “I guess this little hawk begged hard and loud for food – without even thinking about the danger danger.”
Behavior like this is highly unusual for a prayer bird, especially for bald eagles. However, biologists fear for the youngster’s life as the eaglets grow much larger than their hawkish brother and come to regard him as food.
“The fact that he has survived this long is absolutely incredible,” said Professor Bird. “But the fact is that he was much smaller, and eagles always hunt things weaker than themselves.”
But even so, bird experts are confident and hopeful that the eagles will guard the baby hawk until it is able to fly on its own. But this may depend on many things, such as the abundance of food or the eagles’ temperament. In any case, so far so good, as the three-month-old falcon looks in very good shape.
“The eaglets he’s been raised with seem to have accepted him as another brother, and the parents seem to have adopted him as their youngster.” said Professor Bird.
