Birds generally aren’t cool enough to garner spirit animal status—with the exception of this bird-looking dinosaur—but you’ll change your mind after meeting this red-winged blackbird.
The blackbird was caught casually riding on the back of the much bigger and much tougher red-tailed hawk at Nebraska’s Boyer Chute National Wildlife Refuge. The photo, by Mike White, was quickly posted on the Instagram of the U.S. Department of the Interior (which protects natural resources). What a badass bird.
But here to burst our bubble is refuge manager Tom Cox who says he doesn’t think the little blackbird was actually riding the hawk. “I think it was just a well-timed shot,” said Cox.
He explained that what was probably happening was that the blackbird was probably “dive-bombing” the hawk, which is common.
Cox added:
“It’s rather gutsy. When you see them attacking pretty much any bird of prey, they don’t think anything about it.”
The blackbird may have just become my spirit animal.
[via Mashable]
