Endangered Species: The Bald Eagle

Close your eyes and picture this amazing and beautiful bird soaring over mountains tops and across oceans of golden fields and flying over the seas and the cities where we live. This gives this magnificent bird the right to be our Nations All American Bird! It seems that he soars over us to protect us from evil...Did we choose him to be our national bird or did he choose us, so he could be our nation's protector! This was just a thought from this writer's keyboard. Now learn all about The Bald Eagle....here we go.

The Bald Eagle ranges over the biggest part of our continent form the northern reaches of Alaska and the Canada down to northern Mexico. Major wintering areas for the bald eagles occur along the lower reaches of the Mississippi, Missouri, and the Illinois River systems, Florida,
and the Pacific coast.

While the bald eagle was in danger of extinction throughout most of its range 25 years ago, it has made a tremendous comeback. Its populations have greatly improved in numbers, productivity, and security in recent years.

The males are usually about 3 feet from head to tail, weigh 7 to 10 pounds, and also have a wingspan of around 6 ½ feet. All females are larger, most reaching 14 pounds and a wingspan of up to 8 feet. The bald eagles have large, pale eyes, a powerful yellow beak, and great black talons. The beautiful white head and tail feathers appear only after the bird is 4 to 5 years of age.

It is believed the bald eagles live to be 30 years of age or older in the wild, and they live even longer in captivity. They mate for life and build giant nests in tops of large trees, near lakes, rivers, marshes or other wetland areas. They go to the same nest year after year. Their nest may reach 10 feet across and weigh as much as 2,000 pounds! The birds may go thousands of miles in their lifetime but they always nest within 100 miles of where they were born.

Bald eagles will lay two to three eggs once a year and the eggs hatch in about 35 days. The young eagles learn to fly in about 3 months and are mercifully put out on their own about a month later. However, lack of food, bad weather, disease, or human interference can kill many young eagles; sometimes only half will survive in the first year.

Most bald eagle diets consist of fish, but they will feed on almost anything they can catch, including ducks, snakes, rodents and carrion (anything they can find dead or rotting).

There might have been anywhere from 25,000 to 75,000 nesting bald eagles in the lower 48 states, when it was named as our national symbol in 1782. Since then they have suffered in death from habitat destruction and degradation, illegal shooting, contamination of its food source, most likely from the pesticide DDT. There were fewer than 450 bald eagle nesting pairs by the early 1960s, in the lower 48 states.

Bald eagles have few natural enemies. But they definitely need an environment of quiet isolation; tall, mature trees and clean waters. These conditions have changed drastically over the years. It is hard for the bald eagle to find a suitable habitat.

Meanwhile, these birds of prey became prey themselves. They lost the food that they normally eat; people saw them as marauders that killed chickens, lambs and other domestic animals. Large numbers were shot by farmers, ranchers, and so on.

Congress finally passed the Bald Eagle Protection Act the stated no one could kill, harass, possess (without a permit), or sell bald eagles. In 1967 Bald Eagles were finally put on the endangered species list. In 1973 they made the public aware of the Bald Eagles plight.

From fewer that 450 nesting pairs in the early 1960s, there are now nearly 4,500 adult bald eagle nesting pairs and an unknown number of young and sub-adults in the US. There are about 40,000 bald eagles in Alaska and to this date none in Hawaii.

In July, 1995 the Fish and Wildlife Service announced that bald eagles in the lower 48 states have recovered. They have said that they took our national bird off of the endangered list and put them on the threatened list. That is a step down but for the bald eagle it is a step up.

Soon our national bird will soar in the skies...and hopefully become a common sight for Americans to once again behold!