Their foursome impatiently waited on the tee for the fairway to clear at a country club in the Twin Cities southern suburbs. It was a sweltering July day and the roof on the golf carts provided some relief from the sun but none from the humidity that hung in the still sticky air. As the vocal leader of the group was about to yell something to the slow, “old farts” in front of them. He stopped in mid sentence and pointed to an ebony colored mink as it darted across the tee in front of them and up a nearby oak tree. Within seconds a pair of crows began a wing flapping, crow cussing frenzy that quickly put an end to the discussion of the snail-paced foursome in front of them.
Before the surprised group realized what was happening, the mink descended the tree with a fist sized baby crow locked securely in its powerful jaws. The mink scampered across the corner of the tee with the partially feathered bird covered with immature black feathers and disappeared into the algae-covered water.
“Wow, did you see that,” said lefty.
“I didn’t know they ate birds,” said another.
By this time the fairway was cleared and the guy with back-to-back pars had the honor. As he teed up his ProV1 with a red “X”, the mink dashed back across the tee and up the tree. Immediately the crow-cussing frenzy resumed and the nest-robbing mink proudly claimed his second victim. Back across the tee with a flapping fledgling, the mink dodged a dive bombing crow and slipped safely into the murky water.
The pot-bellied man on the tee said, “can he eat one that fast?”
“I think he is feeding them to his babies,” said his cart partner. As the pot-bellied guy was teeing up a second ProV1, after sending the first to a watery grave, the mink appeared for a nest cleaning, encore performance.
By this time the following group was at the tee and our group of spectators was now the slow, “old farts,” having witnessed a highly unusual scene from the discovery channel.
