Eagle Smoke

A Bald Eagle's Smoke 

Fiction

I stared with a gaze as sharp as needles. It pierced through what was once my nest, now a pile of ash. I heard the storm around me lull my instinct into its dreadful darkness. I resisted. My yellow-tinted eyes began to water from keeping them open to long and… emotionally. I glanced down at the branch where the other eagles, like my long gone parents, used to sit where I am perched right now. My claws shredded through the bark and scraped it until only a twig was left. So, I beat my bronze colored wings before drifting off into the sky. But, I slowly descended down when something in that nest caught my eye. I spied a lonely egg charred and covered in cinders. To my misfortune I saw what had happened. There was a small crack in the egg and the yoke was spilling out. This egg! My egg! How is America's symbol supposed to survive?! With vultures circling overhead I knew there was more, But I didn't want to know. I clacked my beak - wanting a taste of revenge. Have I really been gone so long while out hunting fish? Then I just realized what I had not thought through. Humans! I just noticed to my West a few yards away I saw that at least one quarter of our forest was chopped down and our pond was being drained! Don't the humans want us to be alive? I hopped down the tree with my feathers ruffling in the cold, cold wind. Something wasn't right. I waddled over to a small metallic object directly under my tree. That object murdered my innocent bald eagle egg! 

Habitat destruction and deforestation is just two of many reasons bald eagles are struggling to survive. "Why might habitat have anything to do with this?", you might ask. Well, our eagles need a place for shelter that is natural and a safe environment to breed and raise families. Like in this story if a nest was in a tree while people were sawing away at the trunk then it would crack. And not only do they need a sheltered place, so do their fish and other prey so that they can at least eat. With less and less forest to build nests in the eagles will have to face the choice of raising their chicks in human or non-adaptable environments, not having eggs at all, or taking the risk of doing it in their natural home.