Was' aka, Bald Eagle Ambassador to be on KARE 11 March 31 2012

We plan on another blog posting this weekend, but right now I wanted to let you know about an eagle appearance on KARE 11.  On Saturday March 31 2012 during the 9:00 am news hour Was' aka from the National Eagle Center will be appearing. Was' aka will be bringing along Scott Mehus to appear with Ron Schara to talk about eagles and the web cam.  Thanks to Ron for inviting us! So be sure to tune in!

Was' aka is the National Eagle Center's first male Bald Eagle.  He was found as a fledgling in Jacksonville Florida.  He had a tumor on his left eyelid that has since been removed. He is now blind in his left eye.

Although originally called "Ari," the name Was' aka was chosen by visitors at Civic Fest in St. Paul.  Was' aka means "strength" in Dakota. Other choices were Frankie, North Star and Apollo.  Although I liked the name Frankie, because I thought it  would be a way of getting back at Benjamin Franklin for not wanting the Bald Eagle as our National Emblem, I also am always in awe of the strength of the talons, so this was a fitting name for an eagle.

Eggs Please!

All the courtship and nest building behavior leads up to egg laying. Many eagles in the southern part of Minnesota are already incubating eggs. The pair in the Minnesota Bound nest are already incubating eggs. The pair we’re watching near the National Eagle Center in Wabasha have been incubating since March 5 2012. As you move farther north, the photo period is a little bit different, so eagle s typically nest a bit later in northern Minnesota. We are seeing many eagles now along the Mississippi River on their way back to their nesting territories.

 When she’s ready to lay eggs, the female will dig out a small bowl within the nest to receive the eggs. While she’s incubating it’s impossible to see the eggs until she either stands up to turn the eggs or demands her partner take a turn on the eggs. If you’re watching closely, you might get to see the eggs when they make a switch!

 Bald eagles typically lay 2-3 eggs each year. An eagle egg is similar in size to a goose egg, weighing about 144 grams, or about 5 ounces. It is off white in color and may rarely have some blotches of brown. (Golden eagle eggs on the other hand are speckled with ruddy brown on the off white shell.)

                               

The eggs are laid one at a time, usually about two to three days apart. As soon as the female lays one egg, she will begin incubating it. The female does most of the incubating, but the male will take his turns too.

 The pair will incubate the eggs for about 35 days. Because the eggs were not all laid at the same time, each eaglet will hatch in the order that egg was laid and will be slightly older or younger than its siblings. This is different than many birds you might watch in your backyard. Robins, for instance, lay their eggs one each day for up to 4-5 eggs. But the female robin does not begin incubating any of the eggs until she has laid the last egg. This means that all of the baby robins will hatch on the same day. 

 We’ll learn more later about what it means to be 2-4 days younger than your eagle sibling.

Before eggs, first you have to have a nest, and then there has to be courtship!

People are curious whether the warm weather this winter and spring has affected eagles’ behavior. In fact, eagles aren’t too concerned about the weather in terms of when they lay eggs. The main cue for eagles to begin courtship and breeding is the photo period.

The photo period is the amount of daylight hours. This period changes throughout the year. March 21 is the vernal equinox, which means that there is equal hours of daylight and night. As we move toward June 21 the summer solstice, the daylight hours are increasing. A particular photo period will trigger hormones in eagle to initiate courtship and breeding. In our area, we usually see that beginning in February. Interestingly, the photo period in February is similar to that in October and November. We can sometimes see eagles engaging in courtship and nest building in the fall when the photo period triggers those same hormones.

Courtship for eagles can look a lot like fighting. Eagles will fly together and sometimes lock their talons together in mid-air. Sometimes they will stop flying and tumble together, gripping each other’s talons. They will also perform aerial acrobatics. All of this in an effort to assess each other’s strength and impress their potential mate.

Nest building is also a part of courtship and bonding. Eagles continue to use the same nest year after year. Each spring they will add up to a foot in diameter and height to the nest. This process of adding to the nest is part of their bonding to one another, but also to that territory. Eagles exhibit what is called nest-site fidelity. They seem to be bonded to the nest territory, so that if one of the pair fails to return in the spring, the other eagle will try to find a new mate and continue to use that nest and territory.

Because eagles use the same nest year after year and add to it each and every year, after many years of use eagles nests can be up to ten feet across!

With this camera view right into the nest, you can see that there’s more than just sticks in an eagle’s nest. The pair also brings back grassy materials or lines the bowl with their own down to get the nest ready for eggs. They want to create a nice soft spot for those eggs and young eaglets.

National Eagle Center to begin blogging

Greetings to all you fellow wildlife fanatics.

Thanks to Ron and crew for asking the National Eagle Center to blog about eagles.  The National Eagle Center is a non-profit educational facility located along the Mighty Mississippi River in Wabasha Minnesota.  We take care of 4 bald eagles and 1 golden eagle who have all been injured in some way and are now not able to survive on their own in the wild and now serve as ambassadors of their kind here at The National Eagle Center. Our eagles have a beautiful home to share with you where you can get a true nose to beak experience. We have 2 two floors of displays and exhibits that tell the eagles’ stories to the visitor. Our eagles also make public appearances at schools, nature centers, veterans program, native american cultural events and the list goes on and on. Harriet the bald eagle has been on the Today Show, Bonnie Hunt Show, The Colbert Report, The Jay Leno Show, but more importantly she is featured on Minnesota's  Support our Troops license plates for her work with our veterans.

My name is Scott Mehus and I am the Education Director at the National Eagle Center.  I will be one of the employees from the National Eagle Center that will be helping to blog about these magnificent bald eagles who we get watch raise their young.  We will try to blog a couple of times each week sharing with you information about bald eagles and the habitats they live in.  Feel free to ask questions and we will try to answer as many as we can, often answering some of those answers to your questions from the chat page in our blog entry, so please be sure to read them as we update them.

We are all excited about the new camera angle and look forward for everyone at home, work, or school to have the opportunity to be citizen scientists and watch and record the daily life of a pair of eagles. Researchers in the past did not have the kind of technology that we have today, nor was there  funding to have a researcher sit near a nest round the clock such as we are now able to do, so let’s have fun being researchers!!

2012 Watching is Underway!

Welcome to the 2012 season of eagle watching.  It is a very exciting time for all of us associated with this eagle cam.  We are thrilled that they have chosen to use this nest again.  We will soon provide more resources for your eagle viewing pleasure.  But while we work on getting everything running smoothly, here is a video to show the progress this couple is making on the nest.  AND...fun fact of the day... it appears we have a banded male eagle.  More details coming soon...