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America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

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Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#121

Post by WalterBright »

They are always circling over my yard, as they have a nest in the nearby greenbelt.

The fun thing is there's a line through my property. The eagles' territory is west of the line, the hawks' is to the east. Sometimes they fight over the location of that line.

The hawks are half the size of the eagles, but they don't take no ** from the eagles, and it's a fair fight. The hawks usually win the tussle and drive the eagles back over the line. It's like a WW1 aerial dogfight.

And this is in the middle of the Seattle metropolitan area.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#122

Post by steve_adams_86 »

bliteben wrote: post #65
NDizzle wrote: post #14

I just moved back to Arkansas after being in California for 20 years. Here's a picture a local took along AR highway 59. 7 bald eagles hanging out. https://scontent-dfw5-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/155912289_4304... I have some good shots of one eating breakfast behind my house as well. Kind of gory though.

I go birding in a spot near Astoria, Oregon and have counted over 70 individual bald eagles from one spot, some trees will have 20 alone perched in them.

According to national eagle center, "The average eagle needs between ½ and 1 pound of food each day.". So those animals are harvesting 35-70lb of food (other animals) per day. That's incredible to me! There must be so much life in that area.

https://www.nationaleaglecenter.org/eagle-diet-feeding/

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#123

Post by WalterBright »

rdiddly wrote: post #115

This seems as good a time/place as any to remind everyone that the sound an eagle makes isn't the screech Hollywood has made you believe it is (that's a red-tailed hawk). It's actually relatively non-macho (for a superpower's mascot anyway) and sounds like it's laughing. The hawk says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-tailed_Hawk/sounds The eagle says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Bald_Eagle/sounds

I wish hollywood would make a few more recordings. They always use exactly the same one, every time they have a long shot of a wilderness scene. Movies, TV shows, documentaries, everything.

It's worse than the Wilhelm Scream.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#124

Post by hkarthik »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #86
NittLion78 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You still see a lot of them being brought into wildlife rescue hospitals for lead poisoning from having eaten birdshot or in some other way ingesting fired ammunition. Seems to be the biggest issue in the Midwest for them, anyway. Either way, as a kid I remember being told to assume you'd never see one and they'd probably be extinct in my lifetime. Now I couldn't even tell you how many I've seen, from as far east as…

I see reports about 'a dozen' etc suffering from lead ingestion. But no national statistics, just anecdotes. Considering that hunters shoot millions of lead bullets each year, it seems a small problem? It's suggested that birds eat guts from eviscerated animals that hunters leave behind. Perhaps a policy of burying or scattering the guts would solve the problem?

It's a much smaller scale problem than the pesticide issue.

Here in Northern California, we're actually unable to use poisons on pest rodents like squirrels and rats since they often enter the ecosystem through raptors ingesting them.

My friends with a lot of land were advised to get pellet guns and air rifles to deal with their squirrel problems. It's considered the lowest impact to the ecosystem and food chain.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#125

Post by danaliv »

soperj wrote: post #78
danaliv wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get fly-bys from bald eagles in the traffic pattern at an airport I frequent. Even from the cockpit they look enormous. Definitely don’t want one of those monsters to wind up on a leading edge. Incidentally it’s interesting how many raptors seem to like hanging around in airport traffic patterns. I realize there’s a bit of a selection bias here, but I do work at similar altitudes away from airports and sightings ar…

Likely to do with hot tarmac making it easier to catch a upward current.

Funny thing is I never see them (or any other raptors) thermaling over pavement, not even factoring in a thermal getting skewed by wind.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#126

Post by xkde »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #117
nightski wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We see them all over in Minnesota/North Dakota.

If I'm reading their survey correctly, those states have relatively few bald eagles. The reason I checked is that I also remember seeing them often in SD, but was never sure if it was a bald eagle or my parents didn't know/were lying to me. I'm still unsure, they exist but I've never seen a flock like that picture posted here.

Last I checked, Minnesota had the largest population in the lower 48. I personally see them all the time.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#127

Post by rdiddly »

WalterBright wrote: post #123
rdiddly wrote: post #115

This seems as good a time/place as any to remind everyone that the sound an eagle makes isn't the screech Hollywood has made you believe it is (that's a red-tailed hawk). It's actually relatively non-macho (for a superpower's mascot anyway) and sounds like it's laughing. The hawk says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-tailed_Hawk/sounds The eagle says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Bald_Eagle/sounds

I wish hollywood would make a few more recordings. They always use exactly the same one, every time they have a long shot of a wilderness scene. Movies, TV shows, documentaries, everything. It's worse than the Wilhelm Scream.

Absolutely, I was already thinking Wilhelm Scream as I finally arrived at those words in your comment!

Edit: What we need is a satirical movie full of in-jokes, like opening a wilderness long-shot with a Wilhelm Scream.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#128

Post by post_below »

As superpower mascots go, I think the eagle turned out to be pretty much perfect. Large, powerful, masters of their environment, noble from a distance. Up close, easily scared, shameless scavengers who love the opportunity to steal prey from other creatures.

Note: No intention of starting a political conversation, as a resident of said superpower I just love the irony.

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#129

Post by seriousquestion »

rdiddly wrote: post #115

This seems as good a time/place as any to remind everyone that the sound an eagle makes isn't the screech Hollywood has made you believe it is (that's a red-tailed hawk). It's actually relatively non-macho (for a superpower's mascot anyway) and sounds like it's laughing. The hawk says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-tailed_Hawk/sounds The eagle says: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Bald_Eagle/sounds

TIL! What else is manufactured like this? Anyone know if a big list of examples exists?

Re: America’s bald eagle population continues to soar

#130

Post by metamet »

NDizzle wrote: post #14

I just moved back to Arkansas after being in California for 20 years. Here's a picture a local took along AR highway 59. 7 bald eagles hanging out. https://scontent-dfw5-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/155912289_4304... I have some good shots of one eating breakfast behind my house as well. Kind of gory though.

I saw two of them circling my neighborhood in Minneapolis last week. Gigantic, gorgeous wingspans. Few of my neighbors saw me outside looking up in the sky and came out to see what was going on and stood and watched for a bit too.

It's always fun to see them on the drive up north, too. Such cool looking birds.

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