Bald eagle on watch

A dead snag on the riverbank has been a reliable eagle perch for years — good visibility over the water and no leaves to block a launch toward a fish. This one sat for close to twenty minutes, occasionally turning its head to track something moving downstream.

Why it matters

Bald eagles were nearly wiped out east of the Mississippi by DDT and habitat loss, and Virginia’s river population is a genuine recovery success story — the species came off the federal endangered species list in 2007 and has kept expanding since. A river eagle in July usually means a local breeding pair rather than a winter migrant.

Getting the shot

Straightforward: get low, get close without flushing the bird, and wait for the head to turn into clean light. The plain sky did the background work for free.