REPRODUCING RIVER RAPTORS

     During the 1950's to the1970's, bald eagle, osprey and peregrine falcon populations were in a slump because of the use of DDT, plus shooting, poisoning and habitat loss, all inflicted by people.  But from protection by law, not using DDT, hacking out young birds, and the birds' adapting to human activities, even benefitting from them, including nesting platforms in appropriate habitats, these river raptor species all made glorious comebacks.  Today they are again common in North America.

     During the spring and summer of 2023, I had been watching, by live camera and our home computer screen, a bald eagle stick nursery in a large tree along a creek in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania farmland, an osprey platform in the Blackwater River of Maryland's Eastern Shore and a peregrine nest box on a cliff in Minnesota that overlooks the Mississippi River.  Through those cameras, I got thrilling, close-up views of the young birds being fed by their parents, exercising their wings, sleeping, growing rapidly and eventually fledging.  I also noticed that when the babies were young and small, one parent would be on guard at the cradle while the other adult was hunting food for the whole family.  

     The pair of stately eagles I was watching raised three eaglets.  I saw them bring in what I thought to be fairly large fish, cottontail rabbits and wood chucks, all creatures they caught in cultivated croplands and the creeks that flow through them.  That pair of eagles must have been good, experienced hunters, and had a vast territory, to be able to successfully raise three, fast-growing young in farmland where wildlife has a tough time surviving.

     Many pairs of bald eagles still nest in trees and on built platforms along rivers.  But today, many other pairs, as a result of flourishing populations, rear offspring in farmland, including at least a few pairs in heavily human populated Lancaster County.      

     The pair of elegant ospreys raising youngsters on a built platform in the Blackwater River in Maryland were equally good parents to be able to successfully feed three on large fish alone.  Of these three river raptors, ospreys are the most tied to water because of their diet.  And, fortunately for them, they adapted to human-made nesting platforms erected near water.  

     It was always thrilling to see one of the parents bringing a still-flopping fish to the young ospreys.  But I did feel a bit for the fish as it was being torn apart and fed, bit by bit, to the chicks.        

     I watched four peregrine chicks being raised in a wooden box attached to a cliff overlooking the Mississippi River, as was stated earlier.  The picturesque peregrine parents were good hunters to be able to feed birds, particularly pigeons, to that many young at once.  

     Peregrines traditionally raised young on cliffs by rivers, but that species, too, adapted to built structures to rear offspring.  Today, some pairs of peregrines hatch progeny in niches on tall buildings in cities by rivers, and under bridges spanning rivers.

     Bald eagles, ospreys and peregrines have greatly increased their numbers, partly because of their adapting to human-made activities, and being protected by law.  They have benefitted, and so have we who enjoy their majestic presence along rivers, and in cities and farmland.   

       

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