Golden Eagle

by Mollie Mondoux

Adult golden eagles (Aquila chrysaetos) have dark brown feathers with golden feathers at the nape of the neck, which are visible only from close up. Its legs are feathered down to its talons. This eagle lives in rangeland, alpine tundra, or mountainous lands or canyons in western North America from Alaska to Mexico.

Nests are masses of sticks on a mountainous ledge or in a tree. A golden eagle couple may alternate between nests in different breeding seasons.

In Europe, there are nests that have been used for hundreds of years. The golden seems able to soar effortlessly for hours, but when it sights its prey, it can dive at speeds estimated to be 150 to 200 miles per hour. These big raptors eat rabbits and large rodents.

Golden Eagle Recuperates from Lead Poisoning

by Mollie Mondoux

In the short, dark days of early December 1997, a golden eagle was found in a backyard in Mackenzie Bridge, Oregon. It had tried to stand on a woodpile, but slipped off. Something was obviously wrong with its legs. The eagle was standing when it was caught, but its toes were balled under, clenched, and it walked on its “knuckles.” It was also severely anemic and thin. At first, Louise Shimmel, director of the Cascades Raptor Center (CRC) in Eugene, who admitted the eagle as a patient, suspected organophosphate poisoning. But Dr. Pat Redig, of The Raptor Center at the University of Minnesota School of Veterinary Medicine, who gave generously of his time and expertise in this case, suggested testing for lead poisoning.

The blood test did indeed show that the eagle had lead poisoning. The CRC staff started chelation therapy to remove the solubilized lead from the eagle’s blood, giving intramuscular shots of CaEDTA, which binds to the lead ions so that the bird can safely excrete it. Once the lead was out of the blood, more spilled over from the bones had to be removed. The eagle underwent six courses of chelation therapy.

According to Dr. Redig from his book, “Medical Management of Birds of Prey,” lead inhibits an important enzyme in hemoglobin synthesis, so that lead-poisoned birds become anemic. Often the nervous system is affected, impairing motor functions at lower levels of intoxication, even causing blindness and seizures with higher levels.

There is a lot of lead around that can poison wildlife. The larger birds, such as eagles, may get lead poisoning by eating an animal that was shot with lead pellets or had eaten lead pellets. Currently, lead shot cannot be used on waterfowl, but there is still a lot of old lead shot left in the water.

Water birds may eat this lead with the gravel they eat as grit, and these birds may be eaten by larger birds that will also get the lead. Lead shot is still used to kill upland game birds and small mammals. In some places, there is even contaminated water from mining tailings run-off.

This golden eagle was so sick, that it was five days before it could even move its toes. Louise Shimmel made “shoes” for the bird so that it could stretch out its toes, and so on day 12 it was able to stand unaided for part of the day.

It took five weeks before the eagle showed good balance and could stay outside all day long. After weeks of lying down and several months of captivity, this bird was weak and out of shape. It needed to get its flying strength back before it could be released. This is where Kelli Walker at the Chintimini Wildlife Center comes in and tends to the eagle’s physical therapy.

The eagle needs a lot of space in which to practice flying, more space than CWC’s 30-foot x 60-foot flight cage offers. The method CWC uses to exercise large birds to build them up for release is to get them to fly between two posts a couple of hundred feet apart while tethered to a line attached between the posts. Tethering the eagle to the line ensures that it won’t fly off before it’s physically fit enough to fend for itself in the wild.

Getting the golden eagle to practice this exerciese method wasn’t as simple as setting the bird on one post and shooing it to the other. It doesn’t fly if it doesn’t want to.

To motivate the bird to fly, CWC uses food. But even this is not as simple and straightforward as it sounds. First, the eagle has to get used to taking food from someone’s gloved hand. This requires a gradual process of first getting the bird accustomed to having a handler nearby every time it eats, then of having the handler actually deliver the food and having the bird take it from the hand.

After this is accomplished, a handler can put the bird on one post, walk to the other post, hold up her gloved hand with food, and since the bird is accustomed to going to the handler to take food this way, it willingly flies to the other post. By repeating this several times a day for several days, the eagle will be forced to get the exercise it needs.