Merlin on Whatcom Ck trail‏ Nat Whitman 12/10/13

Had a couple of thrilling seconds eye-to-eye on a collision course with a merlin this morning as we both navigated the same stretch of trail (south of Iowa) from opposite directions at inadvisable speeds--and both of us hogging the center of the path! Fortunately, the bird had the "up" option which it exercised at the last possible moment. 

I'm sure there's a chickenhawk joke in there somewhere...

-Nat