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Got this in my mail just now from MDNR for the MN Eagles
You are subscribed to Eagle Cam for Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. This information has recently been updated, and is now available.
Hello Eagle Lovers!
Well, it was a long, long weekend. The eagle pair has been diligently tending to and sitting on these eggs for at least 40 days now. While we haven't given up hope that one will hatch, we are becoming ever more humbled by our limited knowledge of these majestic creatures. Keep in mind that this is one of the first cameras ever placed in an eagle's nest. We are learning right along with all of you while we patiently watch. What the eagles will do, how long they will sit, when they will realize that their eggs are not fertile are all mysteries that we just cannot answer. This is the nature of observational research; watch, wait, record. This is also the value of this camera. We can observe without harming or disturbing the birds. The knowledge that we gain from this observation will help us make informed decisions about bald eagle management, research and protection. We just don't know how long the pair will tend to these eggs before they will abandon them. Will they kick them out of the nest? Will a predator come and eat the eggs? Will they just abandon and not come back? We just don't know, and again, we will not intervene.
What we also don't know much about, is this individual pair. One of them is sporting a silver band, which can tell us a lot about the bird. When the bird is standing, we will try to zoom in on the band to read the numbers. If we get the numbers, we will share all we know. Otherwise, we really don't have any way of identifying these birds. We don't know if they are the same ones that were at the nest last year or the year before, if they are the same two birds, how old they are, etc. On one hand, this is a fabulous indicator that the American Bald Eagle population has recovered. We don't need to, nor do we have the capacity to, band and recover blood samples from all of them anymore, and this is a positive sign of recovery! There are more of them than there ever have been and they do very well without human intervention now. Success!!
Many of you have requested more frequent updates and a forum for chatting. The Nongame Program has limited staff and we just don't have the resources to dedicate to someone responding full-time, every day, all day. We felt the value of sharing this camera with the public outweighs the need for constant dialogue. Hopefully, we can get to that point in the future, but for now, we will continue with updates as often as we are able.
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"The time to protect a species is while it is still common"
Rosalie Edge
Hawk Mountain Sanctuary Founder
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