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The Amreican Bald Eagle is the only eagle unique to North America. It was chosen as our natonal bird because of it’s baldness: he wears no crown, he is independent! And I was chosen by sheer luck to know this bird on an one-to-one basis.
Wednesday, June 9, I was getting ready to go to work. I had a lot to do that day, and was running about making sure I had everything when the phone rang.
"Kris! You’re home! Billy Hanson is around and wanted to know if you wanted to help tag some birds?"
"Ernie, I’m wicked busy today, but tell him thank you just the same."
"You can tell him yourself, he’s right by his cell phone. Give him a call before he tags the eaglets." Eaglets?! Work could wait for this one.
As a zoologist wanna-be and straight up Nature junkie, this was one hell of an opportunity.
I met Bill Hanson, a biologist for FPLEnergy, down on the banks of the Kennebec River in Solon. With him were Kyle and Shearon Murphy, also FPLEnergy biologists. The group has been conducting studies of bald eagles, loons, and ospreys around FPL hydro reservoirs in cooperation with Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, and United States Fish and Wildlife Service.
The four of us trekked across a very mucky eddy over to gravelly area where a pair of bald eagles circled above. This clued me in that the eagles’ nest was near. This particular nest is a rare find in that it is only 40 feet above ground. Usually bald eagles’ nests are about 100 feet high in a white pine. According to Bill, there are 350 nesting pairs in the state, and eagles have moved off the endangered list to the `threatened’ list, which is a great improvement. Maine is doing so well in fact, that we even sent some to eagle-less Vermont.
While Bill put on his harness and helmet for the climb up the tree, Shearon and Kyle prepared the ground work. It looked like a quaint picnic site till you got closer. They laid out a white blanket with various instruments, vials, syringes, water bottles, and of course the paperwork.
I mention my concern about the parents, still protectively circling overhead. I’m picturing all the Nature shows I’ve seen of eagle talons locking on to a slippery fish, and just imagine what they could do to Bill’s face. He assures me that unlike ospreys, eagle parents pretty much do what they’ve been doing, circling and calling out at us, and since they were particularly upset, they make a grunting/snorting pig noise – kinda funny. Bill and Kyle found this Solon nest, about 6-8 feet wide, this spring. They figure the nesting site is only in its second year.
In his climbing garb, complete with tree gaffs, high in the tree, Bill nears the nest.
"Ughh! There’re maggots everywhere!"
Yes folks, our national animal is a pretty grubby creature. Not only is fresh fish from the Kennebec a choice food, but road kill and other such nasties are a delicacy too.
Frightened chicks have been known to jump out of the nest in an attempt to flee biologists, sometimes leading to their demise. Bill, however, takes his time, avoiding sudden movements, talking to times leading to their demise. Bill, however, takes his time, avoiding sudden movements, talking to them, and doing his best to make it a low stress affair. With the help of a specialized scientific tool, an `87 Dodge Colt radio antenna contorted into a shepard’s staff, he hooks an ankle and draws the bird to him.
"This one is fighter!" he exclaims while gingerly placing the eagle into a large duffle bag. Bill says he has bagged over 60 eaglets to date with no jumpers or injuries, but "you can never be too careful with these guys."
The duffle is lowered to Kyle’s waiting arms. At the `picnic’ site, Shearon and I help Kyle with his luggage. Kyle weighed the bag with a scale. (The average weight for a bird this age is around 9.5 pounds. Adult females birds average 13 pounds, and males average 10 pounds. The ladies wear the pants in these families. And unless you get up close and very, very, personal with them, comparing the size is the primary indicator of sex. And here’s an impressive fact; their wingspan is 82-97" that’s over 7 feet!)
"Watch the beak. Shearon, you got the talons? Good."
The fledgling is pulled out of the bag and Wow, what a great bird! Even though he’s still slight of build, he’s beautiful! Not a fluffy down chick, his black flight feathers are still halfway in the sheath, and he resembles a scrawny golden eagle. I admire at how well designed he is for this predatory station in life. His dark, sharp, beak is imposing, and is a force not to be reckoned with. The talons, although they haven’t yet acquired the strength of an adult, are marvelously fierce! When he’s grown, the tendons on the foot will actually lock when he grasps anything. I especially like the eyes. Eagles have a supraorbital ridge that works as a visor and keeps their attention directed on prey down below.
The eaglet is laid on his back on the blanket. Kyle then instructs me to gently hold the wings down. Kyle measures the beak, talon and feather spread. ID bands are affixed to the ankles with pop rivets. The raptor is panting on this warm morning, and at first bites at the Poland Spring bottle of water, Kyle offers him to drink. It eventually clues in it’s not an attack and takes a refreshing drink. Shearon prepares the needles and vials for blood samples. Kyle goes back to assist the eagle handler. Bill explains that while this study keeps record of the eagle population and status, its primary concern is mercury sampling. Mercury is a real problem here in the Northeast. Maine and the Canadian Maritimes receive the highest levels of airborne mercury deposition in North America. Coal burning power plants, trash incinerators and other pollutants in the West spit mercury into the atmosphere, where the Jet Stream picks it up and then drops it onto our happy corner of the world. Mercury does not adhere to soil, so it washes right into our watersheds. Bacteria and basic life forms ingest the mercury, making the organisms carriers. Now it’s in the food chain, and the fish are gobbling it up. The thing with mercury though, once it’s in your body, it stays there, you can’t really get rid of it. As you progress up the food chain, the higher the mercury content, till you get to the top, where loons, otters, eagles and the like are. Since fish is not the staple of our westernized diets, mercury is not as serious of a threat to us humans as it is to predators on top of the aquatic food chain. High levels of mercury can cause neurological problems, like... an eagle forgets to build a nest, take care of its brood, or even bother to find a mate. You can see how this really screws with the natural order of things.
I stretch out a wing and Shearon searches for a vein. One small prick of the needle and we draw a vial of blood. This blood sample can be analyzed for @ 20 different contaminants and we will also look at the DNA.
Kyle returns with the sibling in the duffle bag. The first eagle is given some more water and Bill ties him to a sapling on a soft leash. (We all thought that to be rather clever) The eaglet just sits there and relaxes while we work on its sibling. Bill administers the same work on the second bird and once it came to the terms that we weren’t going to harm him, he just kind of hung out with us while we finished labeling samples and put things away. And I gotta tell ya, it’s pretty friggin cool having an eagle chill with you!
The young birds are returned to their much relieved parents in their bungalow in the sky. We return to our vehicles, Bill getting bogged down again in the mucky eddy on his way to the next of three nests for the day. And me, I’m floating! What a great experience.
So keep an eye out for our neighbors on the river. There’s nesting pairs on the Kennebec in Skowhegan, Waterville, Wyman Lake, Moosehead Lake, and Indian Pond.
For more information about the extent of mercury distribution in northeastern North American wildlife and water, check out the Biodiversity Research Institute at www.briloon.org.
Email nick [at] noumbrella [dot] com with your questions, comments and concerns.
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