by Jim and Melanie
It was a cold and brutal winter in northeast Iowa near Decorah where the Bald Eagle live-streaming nestcam is located. (Wait for the 30 s ad to go away.) The IA winter was the coldest in 35 yrs. Three eggs were laid in February. Hatching started in late March. There was concern whether the cold damaged one or more of the eggs. The third eaglet emerged the morning of April 7. Below is one of the three eaglets up close. Cute, isn’t it? Volunteers are on hand to manually operate the nestcam if something interesting happens.
A volunteer called dragonlainey has a YouTube channel with several good videos of eagle activity. Here is one of the latest. It shows feeding, arrival of fresh fish, and one of the eaglets in a stupor from a full gullet. The parents have raised several broods over the recent years. They are doing a good job again with these three.
Bookmark the links. Live views. YouTube highlights.
Visit often. Enjoy some of the wonder that nature has to offer.
Our View From Iowa 
Reblogged this on JAR Blog….
It is great that we get to watch these things. BTW, it took the eagles a long time to put the first fish out of his misery… I wonder who is watching us…
LOL
There is a hatchery nearby. I think it serves as a ready supply.
Big Brother is watching. 😦
Orwell’s 1984 is haunting us…
A while back I came across, on YouTube, a video of one of the previous broods.Fascinating! I spent the rest of the day going back and watching each of the videos in sequence. How awesome that we have this available for viewing. Such drama! Far more interesting than anything on TV!
Glad to see things are going well in the nest.
One of the brood from 2011 called D1 has been followed via radio transmitter. The latest position was record March 31, 2014 in the NE part of IA.
http://www.raptorresource.org/maps/latest.php
Awwww, they are just the cutest things at this fluffy stage. But still very competent at eating, even though they can hardly stand up. It is a marvel to me that those giant fierce parents can so gently feed them, exactly the right size bits of food. Finding enough food has never been a problem for this family. That’s one of the reasons I like watching them, selfishly I guess, it being so sad seeing eaglets in other nests go without as their parents search for enough to feed them.
Regarding the temperature problem – I agree, it seems miraculous the first two eggs survived when it was so far below zero. Now, I can understand how the parents can keep them warm from above, but doesn’t cold come at them from below, through the nest of sticks (or properly speaking, heat is lost there)? I’m amazed the nest provides enough insulation.
I agree that they are so adept at feeding the little ones. They get their little craw filled and then go into a sleep. It gets even more fun to watch when they are older and more aggressive.
It would be an interesting experiment to outfit a nest with temperature sensors at different spots and depths. The nests are large and deep. But, still, the cold would be a problem from below. They must get enough feathering surrounding the eggs.
Magnificent creatures…even more so when viewing this close. Love that D1 is tracking…great project for students. 🙂
Yes. The site is being followed by a huge number of people and classes. Great stuff to watch.
There’s a whole clutch of people over at Weather Underground who follow this cam. Another one I’ve watched through three broods is a hummingbird cam. It’s just wonderful. The nest is about the size of a walnut, and there are two babies now. Originally the hummer mom was Phoebe Allen, but she disappeared and her babies were taken to a rehabber. But now the nest is in action again – whoever the mom is. We like to think it’s Phoebe, but who knows?
Last year I just happened to be watching when the last baby fledged. It was amazing. Hummingbird cam
There was another h-bird cam I watched last year. This one is different. And, duh, I can’t see much on it in the dark. Something faint was in view.
They are so tiny and fun to watch.