Where's my mommy!

I will admit that even as a well-seasoned eagle nest watcher, that I became a little concerned at the absence of the parents for so long today. Then, I set my emotions aside.

This will happen from here on out as the young are getting big enough that they can be alone for several hours. They can even   go several hours without food now.  This happens in many nests all the time.

 For many eagle can watchers they get used to what happens at one nest. For example, the nest cam that National Eagle Center friend Bob Anderson runs for the Raptor Resource Project in Decorah Iowa.  The parents are almost always there at the nest site. There always seems to be an abundance of food in the nest. The chicks almost always have nice full crops. By the way, remember the crop stores the food, and shows up as a bulge on the upper chest of the bird. We have to remember that the Decorah eagles have an abundance of food sources close to home. They live next to a fish hatchery. They live next to a stream. They live near a road where they can collect road kill.  It's like they live next to a supermarket!

What we are watching is typical of many eagles across this country. Food is harder to come by. They have to work harder to find food for themselves and their young. This means that they may need to roam farther to find that food. This also means that they may be gone for longer periods of time. This is natural.

We all care for this family of eagles.

Mother Nature knows what to do.

Look out below!

Did you know eagles can shoot their poop?

If you’re watching the eagle nest camera closely, by now you must realize that if one of the eaglets has to go ... watch out!

One recent visitor to the National Eagle Center must have seen it herself and she was prepared. When she came into the classroom and heard they were bringing in an eagle, she was reluctant to sit tin the front row.  She’d seen that eaglet in the nest cock its tail and shoot it’s poop! That poop must have been projected like twelve feet! 

Poop isn’t really the best word to use. First of all, what you see get shot out is actually poop and pee! In eagles, as in most birds, urine and feces are excreted together. The white stuff is the urine. Birds excrete far less urine than do mammals, so what is released is concentrated uric acid. When it dries it forms a chalky white substance. The dark parts are the fecal material. Birds have one opening called the cloaca, sometimes called the vent. Together what is excreted as waste is called a mute.

You might see some of the chalky white mutes on the tree or on the ground below an eagles’ nest. This is called ‘whitewash’ and happens because eagles routinely shoot their poop out over the edge of the nest. They like to keep the nest nice and clean!

Other birds have different strategies for keeping a clean nest. After an American Robin feeds their young, they will put their beak near the baby’s vent. The nestling will then excrete it’s waste into a fecal sac which the parent bird holds in their beak and removes from the nest. Eeew... gross! Maybe gross, but it does keep the nest sanitary for the nestlings.

So where do the parent’s go with the fecal sacs? Well, they drop them. Where do they drop them?

On your car, of course! Yes, sometimes on your car. But why?

The main reason that the bird wants to remove the fecal sac from the nest is so that it does not build up and alert predators to the presence of the vulnerable young birds.  Ideally the parent bird wants to drop the fecal sac into water because it will literally be flushed away from the nest area. Nearby streams are ideal. From above, the shiny hood of your new car looks a lot like water. Looks like a great place to drop that load!

So those eaglets aren’t just showing off. They shoot their poop to help mom and dad keep a nice clean nest. (Eagles don’t produce a fecal sac.) Although most of the need to shoot their mutes is while they are in the nest, adult eagles do retain the ability. So on your next visit to the National Eagle Center, you might want to bring a raincoat!

Just kidding … we try not to let them shoot it at the audience!

Celebrate Earth Day, everyday

We will be soon celebrating a very important day, Earth Day. Earth Day was created by Gaylord Nelson, who was a Wisconsin Senator. Mr. Nelson wanted to create awareness about our environment in a time when these concerns weren’t a focus in the political arena.  There may be more awareness about the environment now days compared to then, but let’s continue to follow his lead. We all receive so much joy watching this pair of eagles bring new life into this world, lets spread that joy to some action on behalf of all the creatures.

Despite presenting his thoughts and ideas in 1962, his “Earth Day” didn’t immediately take off. A grass roots movement in 1970 brought this day into the collective of Americans. Mr. Nelson said:

“Our goal is an environment of decency, quality, and mutual respect for all other human creatures and for all living creatures. The battle to restore a proper relationship between man and his environment, between man and other living creatures will require a long, sustained, political, moral, ethical, and financial commitment — far beyond any effort made before.”

All these years later Gaylord Nelson’s vision brings communities, countries and people together for a single minded purpose – to make our environment a better place for today, tomorrow and decades to come.  Please celebrate and do your part.

Native Americans and eagle feathers

For hundreds of years, Native American tribes have been using both bald and golden eagle feathers for cultural and religious purposes.  In the 1970’s, the US Fish and Wildlife established the National Eagle Repository to ensure Native Americans would continue to have access to eagle feathers while protecting eagles from unlawful killing and financial gain from trade of their feathers. Native Americans enrolled in a federally recognized tribe may apply for a permit to receive a feather from the National Eagle Repository.

Here at the National Eagle Center, we maintain permits from the US Fish and Wildlife Service to house the resident eagles. We also collect all the feathers that the eagles molt naturally and send them to the National Eagle Repository. 

At times, the NEC gets called about a dead eagle in the area. Under our salvage permits from the US Fish and Wildlife Service, we can collect the carcass. We then ship the entire carcass to the National Eagle Repository where they can distribute parts or the whole eagle depending on the condition.  An eagle is usually kept for no longer than 3-5 days.  Only one whole eagle may be requested at a time, and currently there are 5,000 people on a waiting list where averages of only 1,000 eagles come in each year.

I want an eagle feather.

With so many eagles’ nests in Minnesota, it’s easier than ever to catch a glimpse of our national symbol. Many people ask if you’re out in the woods and you spot a feather on the ground, what should you do with it? Can you keep it?

The simple answer is no. Eagle feathers, and in fact feathers of more than 800 other species, are federally protected. And, it’s not just feathers; all  parts of the bird are protected from feathers to talons, bones or whole carcasses. Under the Migratory Bird Act, it is unlawful to possess  any native, Migratory Bird in North America. That means, blue jays, cardinals, egrets and eagles are all protected.  You may collect the feathers of non-native species such as European Starlings, or birds that you have obtained the permit to hunt, such as Turkey and Grouse.

The reason all native bird species carry this federal protection is that many birds were driven to near extinction in the 20th century by the feather trade. Millions of birds were killed for their feathers which were fashionable on ladies’ hats.

Eagles are also protected by another federal law, the U.S. Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, which requires federal permits for possession of any eagle part, as well as stiff penalties for harm caused to eagles, including disturbance of eagle nests. That’s why we recommend if you see a feather on the ground, look at it, show it to a child, take a photo if you like, but leave it there.

Can Native Americans have eagle feathers?  

We will answer this question later in the week, for now go back to watching those cute little eaglets,  they will grow up fast!

                                                                            Written by Abbey Ruppert NEC Education Specialist