| Birds: Species | Eagles in Massachusetts NATURAL HISTORY
The Bald Eagle has always been a powerful totem in the United States, revered by the Native Americans, and chosen by the European settlers as the symbol for their new homeland. The Bald Eagle is justly called the American eagle, since it occurs only on this continent. It is essentially a fishing eagle, and therefore typically occurs near seacoasts, large rivers, and lakes. Many people are surprised to learn that our national emblem is easily seen at the right time and place in Massachusetts.
DECLINE
The Bald Eagle was once a relatively abundant species across North America, but suffered an alarming decline in the 1950s and 1960s with the use of the pesticide DDT.
When DDT was spread on agricultural fields, the rain would wash it into rivers and lakes. It was absorbed by tiny organisms in the water, which would then be eaten by larger organisms, and up the food chain to the fish that comprised the mainstay of the eagles’ diet. DDT had a catastrophic effect on the eagles’ ability to produce the calcium needed to coat their eggs. As a result, the eggs were laid with softs shells, or no shells at all, and were crushed by the weight of the brooding parent. In 1972, the Federal government banned the use of DDT in this country, and the Bald Eagle population in the United States has now recovered to the point where it has been changed from “endangered” to “threatened” status.
EAGLES IN MASSACHUSETTS
The Bald Eagle was historically a very rare breeder in Massachusetts, and prior to 1989, the last presumed nesting of this species was at the beginning of the century. In 1982, however, the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife teamed with Mass Audubon to launch a project to restore the Bald Eagle as a breeding bird in the Commonwealth.
In the spring of that year, two eagle nestlings were imported from Michigan and raised in a specially-constructed nest platform on a remote peninsula in Quabbin Reservoir. These chicks were fed by eagle puppets, so they would imprint on their own species, rather than on humans. The hope was that these young birds would remain, or return to breed in the area in which they were reared. The birds were successfully introduced into the wild, and between 1982 and 1988 (the year the program ended), 41 eagle chicks were brought from Manitoba, Nova Scotia, and Michigan, to be raised and released at Quabbin Reservoir.
Bald Eagles take five or more years to reach breeding maturity, and in 1989, two pairs of eagles successfully reared young at Quabbin. The parents included “Ross,” the first eagle to be raised at Quabbin in 1982. During the summer of 2009, biologists from the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife banded 37 eaglets at 21 nests across the Commonwealth. The largest concentrations of eagle nests are at Quabbin Reservior and along the Connecticut River. Other locations in Massachusetts include: Middleborough, Sheffield, Hadley, Holyoke, Lunenburg, and along the Merrimack River. The 37 eaglets that fledged in 2009 established it as a very successful breeding year.
 IDENTIFICATION
An adult Bald Eagle is unmistakable, with white head and tail contrasting sharply with its dark body. First year young birds are entirely dark, and do not acquire their full adult plumage until their fourth or fifth year. A similar species, only occasionally seen in Massachusetts, is the Golden Eagle, which is entirely dark with a golden wash over its head and neck.
BREEDING
Eagles mate for life, or until one of the pair dies. Courtship behavior can include a spectacular flight display in which the birds lock talons and tumble down through the air for hundreds of feet. The pair constructs a nest of sticks lined with finer materials, usually high in a living tree. New material is added to the nest each year, so that thirty to forty-year-old nests have been recorded up to twelve feet deep and weighing a ton or more. Females lay one to three eggs, which hatch at approximately 35 days. Both parents share in the incubation and feeding of the young. In July, somewhere between 10 and 14 weeks after the babies hatch, they are ready leave the nest, but the parents will continue to feed and care for them until September or even October.
FOOD
Eagles are largely fish eaters, but will occasionally take a duck or small mammal. If carrion is available, it will be readily accepted.
WHERE TO SEE EAGLES IN MASSACHUSETTS
In the winter the population of Bald Eagles increases. These are primarily birds from breeding areas to the north which come south looking for open bodies of water where they can find food. During the 2004 Midwinter Bald Eagle Survey, 61 birds were recorded, 39 of these at Quabbin Reservoir. Enfield Lookout at Quabbin, just off Route 9 in Belchertown, is a popular place to look for eagles. Another excellent place to look is the Merrimack River between Newburyport Harbor and the Haverhill line.
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