Do Look Up!
By Rosemary Staples
Contributor
January 5 was National Bird Day, celebrated annually to promote appreciation for our high-flying friends. With our focus now on the New Year, what better bird to spotlight than our national symbol, the Bald Eagle? The story of its decline and comeback is one of the most successful conservation tales of all time.
Historical records estimate the U.S. had 100,000 nesting eagle pairs in the 1800s. By 1963, hunting, habitat loss and pesticides had reduced their numbers to a record-low 417 pairs. Then, Rachel Carson’s book, “Silent Spring,” highlighted the dangers of the chemical DDT and kickstarted the environmental movement. Ten years later, the U.S. banned DDT, passed the Endangered Species Act, and eagle numbers soundly rebounded. By 2020, the Fish and Wildlife Service reported 71,400 breeding pairs in the lower 48 states. At this rate, a return to the 100,000 nesting pairs is definitely doable.
Closer to home, the Nature Conservancy reported 475 active eagles’ nests in South Carolina, up from only thirty in the 1970s. Almost 200 of those nests are in the ACE Basin between Charleston and Beaufort, tucked along rivers and impoundments. Nests on Hilton Head, Daufuskie Island and Bluffton may number in the double digits, although that’s only a guesstimate. Their cone-shaped nests, or “eyries,” are tucked in the tallest pines near open water.
Sometimes nests are in neighborhood trees, hiding in plain sight while humans wander below, oblivious to the avian world above.
The first active Bald Eagle nest in Bluffton was discovered in 1998 on the May River by residents Shelly and Branden Waring. Being avid birders, they notified the SCDNR and watched the entire seven-month breeding season from their kayak. The eagles grew accustomed to the Warings’ presence, who kept a respectful distance, but they saw it all — nesting, courting, mating, incubating, hatching, hunting, feeding, and finally, the eaglet’s first flight. As the juvenile grew in strength, they saw less and less of the clan and were gone by the end of spring.
By January, most eagle eggs have been laid or have already hatched, while adults hunt for fish, mammals, even carrion, to feed their brood, so do look up. You might spot an eagle steal an osprey’s catch or scoop a mink out of the May River. Most mornings, an eagle is posted on a Skull Creek tower as you leave Hilton Head. A rare possibility is to witness a pair entwined in a daring mating ritual known as the “death spiral,” where eagles soar upwards, lock their talons together, then spiral down to the earth and release their claws seconds before crashing to the ground!
Bald Eagles mate for life and return to the same nest each year. Both birds supply the materials necessary for the upgrade, in a sort of “foreplay” that stimulates hormones and bonding while the two redo their eyrie. Observers note that when the female is satisfied with the job, she lifts her tail to signal copulation and the male hops on top, over in five seconds.
Once a clutch is laid, usually 1-3 eggs, the female takes charge of most of the incubation, while the male hunts double-duty for the next 35 days. They alter roles occasionally as even the most dedicated parent needs a break from routine. After the chicks’ hatch, they will require 10-12 additional weeks of care, protection and feeding before strong enough to fledge. Sometimes, they need a little parental push, as pictured here.
Eagles mate any time of year as Kay Grinnell, president of Hilton Head Audubon, can attest. “We were having a cocktail party on my back deck, late in the spring, when a pair of eagles swooped onto a branch, copulated for us, then flew off.” It was well past mating season, so perhaps the two were empty-nesters.
Rosemary Staples is a member of Hilton Head Audubon, long time Lowcountry resident, writer, speaker, storyteller and Master Naturalist.
