Travels with Charlie: A raft of coots

Story and photos by Gordon Snyder

Valentine's Day looked like a typical grey cloudy dull-looking day when I took Charlie for a for a walk. Seemed like nothing going on. Boring. All this happened in five minutes.

Then a huge raft of Coots caught my attention. They were moving like a black blob just offshore of the North Lake Washington shore by the beach along the Burke Gilman Trail.

There must have been thousands as they swam and fluttered to get closer together.

What the heck?

Looking around for a minute or two, I spotted why…

A Bald Eagle was cruising above and making them crazy. (upper left above the raft)

Safety in Numbers!

As the eagle flew over them they formed a tighter line formation.

The Eagle landed in a tree and just watched them frantically move their raft away.

All of the Coots stayed tight and moved away even without a leader.

All they wanted was to get outa there.

The eagle finally just resumed the soaring flight…

No Coots were harmed in this story.