I see at least two eggs!
At this time of year, when many people are celebrating a great miracle.....I return to the Raptor web site to see what is going on with our young female Bald Eagle who recently returned from her long summer flight to Canada. Not much happening. She and her younger brother who was part of the 2012 clutch are apparently enjoying wintering in the Northeast and Northern Iowa areas. I discovered this little description of her adventures. Also a miracle, IMHO.
About D1
D1 is a female bald eagle who hatched in a cottonwood in Decorah, Iowa in March of 2011. We captured her in July of 2011, after she had been on the wing for a few weeks, and fitted her with a transmitter. In the fall of 2011, D1 traveled to northern Minnesota before returning to overwinter in NE Iowa. In the summer of 2012, D1 traveled to Hudson Bay, Canada, before returning to overwinter in NE Iowa. A few quick facts:
- As of December 2012, D1 had traveled over 4,000 miles.
- Her longest single distance ocurred between September 17 and 19 in 2012, when she traveled an incredible 147.5 miles.
- Her furthest point north was recorded on July 3, 2012, 919 miles from her natal nest.
Our tracking has shown us that D1 spends a lot of time on watersheds. She has been on the Little Turkey, the Turkey, the Wapsipinicon, the Cedar, the Upper Iowa, the Maquoketa, the Yellow, the Volga, the Black, the Chippewa, the Mississippi, and the Saint Croix rivers, to name a few. She spent a great deal of time on Yellow Lake in Wisconsin, migrated down the west side of Lake Superior with thousands or millions of other birds, and lived up on Hudson's Bay in Ontario, Canada, for over a month.
It's fairly common for eagles to travel more when they are younger, and then settle down and raise young in the same general area they hatched in. If D1 survives to adulthood, we'll be very curious to find out where she eventually nests.
All I can say is WOW! I'm consumed with amazment. Over 4,000 miles and she won't be two years old until this coming spring.
Mom and Dad celebrating the hatch / birth!
Mmm, dinner! Fresh Fish!
Believe you guys might have remembered me mentioning Great Horned Owls are nicknamed the "Lion of the Bird World" and for good reason. They don't build a nest of their own, take over other birds nests, and have even driven Bald Eagles off (see "Prey" in below link). The expert birder/naturalist at the park where I used to work found 2 larger Red-tailed Hawks dead under their next and said it was evident Great Horned Owls had done this nasty deed by the large talon marks on them.
http://www.adirondackwildlife.org/GreatHornedOwls.
Even if the Bald Eagles, with almost twice the wing-span, were able to fend off the Great Horned Owls from their nest the eagles are well aware the owls now know where their nest is and the eaglets would never be safe.
I also read in the eagle blog that non-nesting Bald Eagles in the area disturbed the pair of nesting eagles. It also said the drought in Oklahoma may have caused a food shortage causing the female also having to leave the nest alone to hunt. Wouldn't doubt this may have been when the Great Horned Owls started moving in and taking over the nest.
Pretty sad and didn't seem like the pair of Bald Eagles had much going for them this year with all the competition along with the food shortage. 
