Bird of the Week or at this point every six weeks or so.
A God Bless America one if you will. Bald Eagles have been synonymous with the United States since 1782 when it was declared the National Bird of the United States and also its National Symbol. Most notability, Ben Franklin was not a fan of this decision saying “I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country; he is a bird of bad moral character; like those among men who live by sharping and robbing, he is generally poor, and often very lousy. The turkey is a much more respectable bird and withal a true, original native of America.” The idea of placing so much moral weight on an animal is very interesting and while the Turkey is a great bird in its own right, it would make Thanksgiving something of a bittersweet holiday.
Anyone with regular access to a lake or park near water might recognize that there seem to be more Bad Eagles visiting year after year and while this is true in most places the Bald Eagle was in a very different position not even 15 years ago. The first efforts to protect the Bald Eagle (which wasn’t already covered in the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in 1918) came in 1940 with the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act (known as the Bald Eagle Protection Act when passed). This act gave the protections that we commonly know and associate with Bald Eagles: illegally collecting the birds or their eggs, the destruction of nests or habitat, or collection of feathers.
While hunting and habitat loss were major contributors to the decline of Eagle populations in the early 1900s, the expansion in the use of DDT (which was a pesticide to control insects, specifically mosquitos) during and after WW2 played the biggest role in their decline. According to the US Fish and Wildlife Service: “DDT and its residues washed into nearby waterways, where aquatic plants and fish absorbed it. Bald eagles, in turn, were poisoned with DDT when they ate the contaminated fish. The chemical interfered with the ability of the birds to produce strong eggshells. As a result, their eggs had shells so thin that they often broke during incubation or otherwise failed to hatch.“ In 1963, there were only about 417 nesting pairs of Bald Eagles in the US, a stark drop from the 100,000 nesting pairs when the Bald Eagle was adopted as the National symbol in 1782.
It took almost another decade before DDT use was banned and the Bald Eagle was placed on the Endangered Species List. While this designation may seem arbitrary or political at times it gave the Bald Eagle an increased amount of resources to help with protection, captive breeding, and reintroduction methods. After almost 35 years on the Endangered Species List, the Bald Eagle was delisted in 2007 with at least 9,789 nesting pairs in the lower 48 states. In 2018, with the most recent census on the Bald Eagle population, there were 316,700 individuals, including 71,467 nesting pairs (quadrupling the Bald Eagles surveyed in 2009). This number is still a ways off from the 1782 number but the Bald Eagle is one of the most successful conservation stories in US history.
Taxonomically, eagles are an interesting subset of birds. While ‘eagle’ is commonly used to denote any bird of prey that hunts large vertebrae, it is not a genus or family of birds. The Bald Eagle is in the genus Haliaeetus, which it shares with other ‘sea eagles’ found throughout Europe and East Asia. The Bald Eagle is the only sea eagle found in the new world (not counting the Steller’s Sea Eagle who has been vacationing in Canada for the past few years). The Golden Eagle is in the genus Aquila and is classified as a ‘true eagle’. While I am iffy on the genetic components that differ between the two genera, these ‘true eagles’ diets do not normally consist of fish and are normally completely dark in color.
Aside from the Bald Eagle’s striking white plumage on its head (which is where it gets its name), most commonly we associate Bald Eagles with the sounds we hear in movies. A clear and powerful call that brings your attention straight to what we picture as a Bald Eagle. In the past few years, it has become more well-known that this iconic call is not that of a Bald Eagle but the call of a Red-tailed Hawk. I am unsure why this replacement happened but I could guess it’s because the Bald Eagle call sounds a lot like a very large and upset gull.
Bald Eagles start their breeding season in the late fall or early new year depending on where in the continent they are located. If you are lucky enough to be in an area where Bald Eagles are breeding, you may be lucky to see one of the coolest and most interesting mating rituals in birds. While Birds-of-paradise might have one of the most sort-after mating rituals, Bald Eagles perform these rituals in plain sight and put on a show. Dubbed the ‘cartwheel courtship flight’. Director of the Center for Conservation Biology of the College of William & Mary and Virginia Commonwealth University, Bryan Watts, says of this practice “Two bald eagles will fly up high, lock talons and then get into a cartwheel spin as they fall toward the ground, breaking apart at the last minute. And [in] some cases they actually hit the ground.” It is a remarkable sight to see and if you are unprepared it looks like a vicious turf battle. Once these two Bald Eagles match up and start doing their thing this pair will normally mate for life. Only moving on if one of the partners dies since ‘divorce’ rates in Bald Eagles are only about 5%, according to Watts.
I cannot personally remember my first encounter with a Bald Eagle but since I started tracking my birding with Ebird, I have seen one in every state that I have spent enough time in. Of the 61-odd outings that I have seen Bald Eagle(s) in the past 3+ years, an experience from this past month jumps out as the most memorable. On my move out to Montana, a few weeks ago, traveling along i90 in South Dakota occasionally seeing a hawk here or there; there became a stretch where I counted dozens of Bald Eagles sitting alongside the interstate. During a slowdown just past Sioux Falls, there was a roadkill deer on the shoulder that had 3 Bald Eagles necks deep inside it, coming out only for air and to display their newly bright red heads. Something I wish I was able to photograph.
It is a funny thing among folks who bird watch that random strangers will come up to you and ask if you have seen the Eagle. While some people may brush off this conversation and say yes and then go about their business with other birds, I find this interaction incredibly fun that someone else had a Bald Eagle pique their interest enough to bring it up to a total stranger. Bald Eagles are not the rarest birds anymore but they still bring such fascination to so many people. It may be the bird that brings them into the world of casual bird watching. I love to talk about birds and this interaction may make both of our days. It is a conservation feat that Bald Eagles are even around at all so we should embrace them and celebrate the moments we have.
No matter how often I see a Bald Eagle I stop to appreciate them. They are fun, social, and funny birds once you take them off the pedestal that they are the National Symbol and appreciate them like every other wild animal out there. Bald Eagles are a glimmer of hope – outside of being just simply a cool bird.
