While most people try to avoid home improvement projects in the winter, a pair of bald eagles got some much needed help recently from a team of Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) land managers with a very important and timely renovation project.
Since 1989, a sycamore tree on Haldeman Island has been used by at least three pairs of eagles as a nesting site. About two weeks ago, one of the limbs supporting the nest collapsed under the weight of the nest. On Friday, February 17, 2012, Steve Bernardi, PGC Land Management Group Supervisor for Juniata, Mifflin, Perry and Snyder counties, was joined by Terry Willow, Game Lands Maintenance Worker with the River Island Food and Cover Corps Crew, and Scott Bills, Land Management Group Supervisor for Dauphin and Lebanon counties, to construct a platform to encourage the bald eagle pair to reuse this nest site.
The three men measured and cut lumber, used hammers and nails, as well as screws and drills, to secure the lumber in place, and then placed branches and sticks on the platform to encourage the bald eagles, who were watching the activity while perched in nearby trees, to begin rebuilding a nest.
“A pair built a nest in this tree in 1989, and had their first young in 1990. A storm blew the original nest out of the tree in 1995. Scott Bills, who was the Wildlife Conservation Officer in Dauphin County at that time, worked with a Food and Cover Corps crew and PPL to erect the first platform similar to what we put in place on Friday. Adult bald eagles are preparing to nest, and hopefully they will come back and reuse this platform just like they did back in 1995,” Bernardi said.
Haldeman Island played a key role in the recovery of bald eagles in Pennsylvania. In the 80s, it was one of two locations used for reintroduction of eagles brought by the PGC from Canada, in the early years of restoration of eagles to our state. About 40 eaglets were released at the Haldeman Island tower overlooking the ponds on the north side of the island by 1989.
When the reintroduced birds successfully raised young at a nest on Haldeman in 1990, the whole state had only seven nesting pairs. And, there has been an active eagle nest in that spot every year since, except 2004, when the birds took a year off.
In 1983, the PGC began a seven-year bald eagle restoration program in which the agency sent employees to Saskatchewan to obtain eaglets from wilderness nests. In all, 88 bald eaglets from Canada were released from sites at Dauphin County's Haldeman Island and Pike County's Shohola Falls. The resurgence of eagles in Pennsylvania is directly related to this program.
When the restoration program began in 1983, only three Crawford County nests remained in the state. By 2006, the agency announced that the state had surpassed the 100 bald eagle nest mark. Just five years later, in 2011, the number of known bald eagle nests had doubled to 203, which spread out over 50 counties.
Although removed from the federal endangered species list by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2007, the PGC currently classifies the bald eagle as a threatened species in Pennsylvania. Residents aware of a bald eagle nest in their area are asked to consider reporting it to the PGC. Email the PGC at pgccomments@pa.gov and use the words "Eagle Nest Information" in the subject field.
For those interested in understanding bald eagles, the PGC has launched a series of publications "Eagle-watching in Pennsylvania," which can easily be accessed by clicking HERE.
Source: Jerry Feaser of the Pennsylvania Game Commission
More about the Pennsylvania Game Commission:
- PGC announces deadline for ads in PGC Digest
- PGC prepares for controlled burns on SGL 176
- PGC license display requirements takes effect next week
- Game Commission encourages participation in GBBC
- Hunter exposed to rabies by field dressing deer
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