Sunny, breezy and warm (mid 80s)
On the February 5th blog of this year, I reported about “urban birds” and included a report on the Bald eagles which chose a city corner lot to construct their nest and bring new eagles into this world. The tree in which they have now nested for at least the past 10 years is protected by a chain link fence that surrounds the grounds of the Catholic school where the large pine is located. We were happy to report that the two eagles at that time that the parents had successfully introduced two young eagles to the growing population of US Bald eagles. We watched and reported on several occasions the development of the eaglets noting in the February 8th blog that they were branching….learning to fly while not leaving the nest.
We.ve checked on a regular basis to see if there was any indication that the birds were in fact leaving the nest. Today, we visited once again and were excited to see that the nest was empty!
It looks as if the young eagles have finally fledged and are out and about. Since it takes around 10 – 12 weeks for an eagle to attain first flight, these birds were most likely born around the beginning of the beginning of January. When we first arrived here in New Smyrna Beach in late January, the birds were pecking at food scraps dropped into the nest by the parents, something they do after the first three weeks of their lives.
We’ll miss seeing the four eagles on their nest for the rest of this year. But eagles are very site loyal when it comes to returning to the previous year’s nest, and so we’ll look forward to seeing them back on the property of the Sacred Heart School once again next year.
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