Joann Merritt's Essays

December 7, A Day Of Infamy
January, 1992

An unfortunate American Coot at Anderson’s arm of Soda Lake knows why the Marsh Hawk’s name was changed to Northern Harrier. A harrier is one who troubles persistently from or as if from all sides, besieges, makes a surprise attack on or disturbs by repeated attacks. That accurately describes what the Northern Harrier did to the American Coot who was totally unprepared for this December 7th surprise attack.

When Don first noticed the female harrier she was in the water with her wings raised. Presently she rose and hovered a few feet above the water and when the coot’s head appeared she attacked it. The harrier repeated these attacks, causing the coot to go underwater for safety each time it dared to surface. Occasionally she would glide away a short distance, then return to attack again. The hundreds of other nearby coots did not rally around their beleaguered fellow, but swam calmly toward the main lake.

The Midnats had their scopes and binoculars focused on this drama. We supposed the harrier was attempting to kill the coot but was unable to lift it out of the water. Ted Jones had once seen a harrier retrieve a dead Green-winged Teal from the water’s edge, but had not observed how the duck had met his demise. We questioned why the coot didn’t swim quickly to deep water, dive and thus escape his predator. The coot finally managed to move away from shore and the harrier glided swiftly away to resume her hunting. We were very fortunate to witness this uncommon behavior of two common species.

That night while reading in Field Guide to Hawks (a Peterson guide), I found this statement about the Northern Harrier. “This raptor has been reported to drown waterfowl.” The harrier we observed was evidently holding her prey underwater while balancing herself with raised wings and the coot was so nearly drowned that it was unable to swim away. Frances found a description of an instance in which a Northern Harrier was attacking a young coot when the parents, along with nearby Ruddy Ducks, counter-attacked and killed the harrier. What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander!