Albert Cutler and his family were returning home from Sunday church service about 10:30 a.m. on July 27. Albert was driving alone in his truck. His wife Stephanie, son Quinton age 13, and 7-year-old daughter Bernadette were in another family vehicle ahead of Albert’s truck.
“I looked up and saw a bald eagle flying low, struggling with something in its talons,” Albert tells Wired2fish. “I’ve never seen an eagle near here in the seven years we’ve lived in the Oconomowoc, Wisconsin area. But there it was, flying very erratically.”
Albert says the bird was flying low, just 20 feet above Wisconsin Highway 16 near 1,200-acre Okauchee Lake located in Waukesha County, west of Milwaukee.
“The eagle was getting closer and closer, lower and lower, and struggling with whatever it was carrying,” said Albert, a government employee. “I thought I was going to hit it with my windshield. But it dropped what it was carrying and immediately flew up and away.”
Albert hit something with his truck, and believed it was a fish. He thought he simply drove over the fish, and he continued driving.
“My son and wife saw the whole thing, too, in their car, and my son called me,” Albert explained. “He asked me if I hit it with my truck and I said I thought I ran over whatever it was.”
Once at home the family inspected Albert’s vehicle. That’s when they discovered a small but whole 12-to-16-inch largemouth bass was jammed headfirst into the front of the truck.
“It was wedged tight between the fog light and car bumper, and it was really jammed in there behind its gill plates,” Albert said. “I had to use a hockey stick to pry it loose. There was no damage to my car, and the bass looked completely fresh and whole.”
They believe the eagle had caught the bass from nearby Okauchee Lake, but the wiggling fish was just too much for the bird to maintain flight. So, it dropped the bass just as Albert’s truck drove under it.
“I thought about cleaning and eating it, but I didn’t know how long it had been dead, so I froze it,” Albert explained. “Some friends said I should mount it because it sure was a great story about how we ‘caught’ it.”
Instead, they donated the bass to a local wildlife rescue service, which said they would feed the bass to some young raccoons they were raising.
“At least the fish was used to sustain some type of wildlife, which seems fitting, since an eagle caught it.”
