Big Year for National Icon

Posted 3/19/15

The Audubon Society of Rhode Island is reporting that it has been a record year for an American icon in the Ocean State.

Bald Eagles have been spotted soaring above the Seekonk River in Providence …

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Big Year for National Icon

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The Audubon Society of Rhode Island is reporting that it has been a record year for an American icon in the Ocean State.

Bald Eagles have been spotted soaring above the Seekonk River in Providence and perched in trees along the Blackstone River Bikeway in Cumberland. From the shoreline in Newport, to Coventry and locations across South County, there have been numerous eagle sightings reported throughout the state. Until quite recently, these large raptors teetered on the brink of extinction. They had not been seen in Rhode Island until the past decade. And yet, they are now here in numbers.

The Long Road Home

“Here’s a bird with an immense distribution across the country when we virtually extirpated [destroyed] it.” Ornithologist and Audubon board member Dr. Charles Clarkson is exploring what has brought a national symbol to where it is today. “We’re just now starting to pull ourselves back from that situation.”

Clarkson says that it’s a misconception that Bald and Golden Eagles declined mostly from the use of the pesticide DDT. “While it played a rather important role [in the destruction], there’s much more to it than that.”

Clarkson explains that there were about 100,000 eagles across America in the 1700s. That number went into decline soon after because of habitat degradation, along with a developing salmon fishing industry. The great forests that dominated the American landscape vanished as the young country grew.

“Habitat loss has been a precursor to every species decline on earth,” Clarkson said. “Loss of resources and actual aggressive degradation of food sources, through DDT and lead poisoning from eagles feeding on carcasses of animals that contained lead from bird shot, did further damage. The insults came from multiple directions.”

Some of the mainstays of the eagle diet, such as shore birds and ducks, began to dwindle because of over hunting. Then there was also another factor that, by today’s standards, seems unthinkable: hunting.

“We had allowed farmers and fishermen to hunt these animals,” Clarkson said.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife (USFW) says that the eagle population dropped to an all-time low of 417 nesting pairs in 1963, even after enacting several laws to protect the eagle dating back as far as the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1936. The use of DDT remained common until 1972, when the federal government banned it. In 1973, arguably the single most important element in the eagle recovery process became a law: the Endangered Species Act.

Not only did the act protect raptors against hunting, it “reduced the threats to Bald Eagle habitat, including nesting sites and summer and winter roost sites,” according to the website www.usfw.gov. Habitat protection, eagle restoration, and monitoring combined to bring Bald and Golden eagles to the point where the population, now climbing to an estimated 9,789 breeding pairs, was de-listed in 2007.

Choosing a Nesting Site

Eagle nests may be up to 10 feet across and, according to USFW, weigh up to 4,000 pounds. The birds, which mate for life, tend to return to the same sight year after year. The life expectancy of an eagle in the wild is roughly 30 years. Because they take five years to reach sexual maturity and acquire their distinctive plumage, sub-adults are often mistaken for Golden Eagles.

“Juvenile sightings are a good thing year ’round,” Clarkson said. “They have no mate; they’re just exploring the territory. It’s good that these birds are exploring for long distances. That helps in maintaining genetic diversity.”

Eagles prefer fresh water nesting sites, and are more prey specific during mating season, but they become generalists in the off-season.

“They’re more opportunistic,” Clarkson said.

It’s difficult to tell where the juveniles in Rhode Island originated from, Clarkson said. Maine has the largest nesting population of Bald Eagles in New England, but Virginia also has a large population, and eagles are more than capable of covering either distance.

“The technology to monitor them [and thereby determine a likely origin site] is a real challenge,” he said. “It’s both very expensive and really labor intensive.

“Having these birds breed in state would be a real bonus in terms of the condition of the habitat,” he continued. “It would mean that we’ve conserved the habitat well. They tend to shy away from fragmented habitat. They may approach [potential nesting] areas from three to four thousand feet and then they assess the nesting conditions from up there.”

There was a nesting site in Scituate from roughly 2003 to 2007, and there are three, possibly four current sites in the state, but it remains to be seen how many eagles will choose to remain in Rhode Island.

The Audubon Society of Rhode Island is an independent not-for-profit environmental organization dedicated to protecting birds, wildlife, and their habitats through environmental education, advocacy, and land conservation. The state’s first environmental organization, the Society now protects nearly 10,000 acres in a network of refuges, pristine properties and wildlife habitats. One of the largest private environmental educators in the state, in 2013 Audubon staff taught approximately 22,000 students across the region.

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