Rfalconcam Forum

Found on their FB page:  :clap:

Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge:

The eagles have landed. We just received a report that the bald eagles have started incubating in the nest in Cayuga Pool. A bird was seen sitting there which is a good sign. Also the birds in the nests on neighboring State lands (Oak Orchard and Tonawanda Wildlife Managment Areas) are sitting. Still waiting on the birds in Mohawk Pool.

Nice...thanks!

Medina, NY.

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110715/NEWS01/110715005/Injured-bald-eagle-mates-reunited (http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20110715/NEWS01/110715005/Injured-bald-eagle-mates-reunited)

Now that's a romance novel, with a happy ending!! Thanks so much, what a story!!  :heart: :heart:

Really, really happy ending.  Thanks. :bguitar:

Great story but wonder where their nest site is located at Iroquois.  We've been over several times this year to the Cayuga site watching the Eagle family there so I know it's not them. I know they did have a couple other pairs nesting there.

Another article about the Eagles posted by the Buffalo News:

http://www.buffalonews.com/city/article490703.ece (http://www.buffalonews.com/city/article490703.ece)

And they made it to NPR All Things Considered (text posted, audio available later this evening)

Eagle Love Story (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/07/18/138478525/eagle-love-story-injured-mates-reunited-at-rehab-center)

I absolutely love this story. I hope they let us follow their time together.

A very cool story! This pair was truly meant to be together!  :heart:  :heart:

So sad that they can't be released but hopefully some place will be able to take both of them to live out their years together.

Maybe even have babies next year. Hey, Savanah and Derek do it!  :heart:

Pair of injured eagles prove to be lovebirds

Updated: July 16, 2011, 3:49 PM

 They are the fiercest-looking lovebirds you'll ever see, and they demonstrate their bond by eating dead rats side by side, wings touching.

The two seriously injured bald eagles, found two months apart and more than a mile away from each other near the Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge, were rescued and reunited in a wildlife rehabilitation facility in Medina last week.

Wildlife rehabilitator Wendi Pencille already was treating the female bald eagle, who snapped a tendon in her wing, at her Bless the Beasts Foundation, when she picked up the injured male bald eagle.

"What if he's her mate?" Pencille thought at the time.

The chances were slim, almost impossible. But these eagles beat the odds.

By their behavior, it is clear the two eagles were a bonded pair before their injuries, according to Pencille and other experts.

The bald eagles, a threatened species in New York, each wear state and federal bands, and it's possible that a photo of the pair on a nest together earlier this year could prove their bond.

But Pencille and other wildlife experts don't need photos -- the bald eagles' behavior tells the story.

The female was comfortably housed in a large flight cage, complete with tree stumps the bird could use as steps to climb to a perch.

The cage, which includes a pool stocked with fish, was perfect for another bald eagle with a damaged wing -- but only if the two didn't want to kill each other.

"Do we put him in another cage, or do we try to introduce him to her?" Pencille recalled thinking.

Two strange raptors will always clash, resulting in anything from a squawking squabble over a perch to a full-scale attack. Pencille donned her heavy leather gloves and entered the flight cage, prepared to separate the pair if the conflict got too serious.

Instead, when Pencille placed the bedraggled male on the floor, the female swiveled her head and stared at him with her light-colored, piercing eyes.

"He's afraid, because he's in the cage for the first time, then all of a sudden he calls to her, and she goes out of her mind," Pencille said. "She starts pacing the perch, calling and calling, she went crazy, as if when he made the noise she knew who it was."

The male, crying in return, began walking toward the female as she continued to call.

Halfway there, he stopped to eat a dead rat on the floor.

"She actually looked at him upside-down when he did that, as if to say, 'What?'" said Pencille, laughing.

Then, as Pencille watched in amazement, the female swooped down from her perch to get a closer look at the male. After spending a short time on the ground with him, the female hopped back to her perch using the stumps.

"She showed him how to get up on the perch," Pencille said. "He was afraid, but he finally followed her."

Making the final jump from the highest stump to the perch, the male scrambled, grabbed with both feet, then fell to the ground.

The female swooped to the floor, spent some time with him, then hopped up to the perch again, spreading her wings wide with each hop.

He hesitated, so she did it again.

"She repeatedly tried to herd him up on that perch," Pencille said. "She did it five or six times."

Finally, the male followed her, jumping from stump to stump. His final leap succeeded and he was on the perch next to the female.

Together, apparently again.

"They both settled down, they closed their beaks, they weren't panting, it was as if they had never been apart," Pencille said. "This behavior is unheard of when introducing raptors to each other. I am sure that they were a bonded pair.

"Then the next day, I go out and they are eating rats right next to each other, their wings touching."

Bless the Beasts received its first bald eagle three years ago and Pencille has worked with seven since then.

If the pair were not already bonded, "we would likely see much different behavior than Wendi witnessed," said Joel Thomas, wildlife administrator at the SPCA Serving Erie County.

"There would be much more territorial behavior. There would be some squabbling," he said.

Pencille caught the female on May 4 after a caller reported spotting a bald eagle down on a road in the Town of Shelby.

"I believe she hit power lines, which ended up snapping the tendon between her right elbow and wrist," said Pencille.

She chased the eagle down and grabbed her with her thick raptor gloves.

"She was very weak and emaciated and didn't fight us too much," she said.

The eagle was treated for an infection at the SPCA. With a wing span of more than 7 feet, the bird weighed just 8 pounds when she was caught. She has since gained 3 pounds.

"She is one of the biggest eagles we've ever seen," Pencille said.

"We believed that before her injury, the female had been part of a bonded pair, because there were four nests in the Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge, and one of the nests had failed" to produce chicks, Pencille said. "Our goal was to get her back out with the male, but obviously, due to her injury, that wasn't going to happen."

Two months later, Pencille got a call from Fish and Wildlife Service that an injured bald eagle had been caught on the Tonawanda State Management Area in Alabama.

The male, which is much smaller than the female, had lost the end of one wing and suffered talon injuries from a fight with another raptor, said Floyd "Sonny" Knowlton, a wildlife technician with the state DEC who caught the bird after several callers reported seeing him. The male was also treated by the SPCA in Tonawanda.

"There is nothing sadder than an eagle by itself in one of these rehab facilities," said Knowlton. "Eagles are very social and they like having company."

But, Knowlton says, "I'm not saying they are not a pair; they very well could be."

Photos could prove that the male and female had a nest together. "We don't really need that -- not in my opinion," Pencille said. "Not from the behavior we have seen."

And the eagles' nesting days may not be over. Because of the severity of their injuries, neither eagle will be able to be released to the wild.

"Eagles in captivity could have a nest -- we'd have to give them the facilities to do it, but there are places that do breeding of handicapped raptors," Pencille said.

When Bless the Beasts had only the female bald eagle, Pencille received a letter from the Endangered Species Unit, recommending that she stay there, for education and to foster any bald eagle chicks that might be found.

"As soon as we learned that the male was not releasable, I called the DEC right away and told them that we believe it is her mate. So if they can't stay with us together, send them to another facility but keep them together," Pencille said.

"It just feels like the right thing to do, to keep them together."

  :heart:

BuffaloNews.com

What a great report about those two eagles. I especially like: "Halfway there, he stopped to eat a dead rat on the floor."

The way to a man's heart...

 :dance1: A real feel good story!  :heart:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/07/19/138478525/eagle-love-story-injured-mates-reunited-at-rehab-center (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/07/19/138478525/eagle-love-story-injured-mates-reunited-at-rehab-center)  Here's a feel-good story.  (Read more) 

"Two seriously injured bald eagles, found two months apart and more than a mile away from each other near the Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge," in Western New York State, "were rescued and reunited in a wildlife rehabilitation facility in Medina last week,"



WOW, what a great story and may they live happily ever after.  :heart:  Sad they are both injured and non-releasable but they have each other.

Awww... :heart:

Wonderful story!


Nora in NW Florida

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Shaky posted this story on here in 2011 under Iroquois NWR Eagles 2011.  Great story and good to read again. I wonder if they're still alive and together.

I merged this with the original topic.

A couple updates:

10-17-2011

 Thanks for reminding me. I get so busy here getting ready for winter, that I forget to update the websites. The eagles are doing well. They are still here awaiting a decision by the NYS Dept of Envt Cons. as to their placement. I applied for the permits and they have interviewed me several times. I'm just waiting to hear their decision. If they grant me the permits then I have to apply to the federal govt (USFWS) for the same permits. Government wheels turn s l o w l y. While I am anxious to hear, I am also glad they are being so thorough. Until then the eagles are here. They are starting to accept me not as a threat, but a provider of food. While they still jump off their perch when I enter their enclosure, they also immediately look to see what I have in my hands. If it is food they will start food calling to me. They will also eat in front of me as long as I go to the far end of the enclosure and sit down. This brings my eye level down to theirs and makes me less of a threat. It may not seem like much but it is great progress. Up until a few weeks ago, I was always the evil one who caught them and restrained them and treated their wounds and medicated them. This process was twice a day and it was always stressful and often painful for them. So competeing with this memory has been a real hurdle for them and myself. I'll try to remember to update mroe frequently although if the permit comes you will probably be able to hear me cheering if you just open your windows. :O)

Feb 2012
Here's an update. I have not heard from the USFWS yet on the fate of our eagles except that they did cash my permit checks yesterday. So maybe sometime soon they will act on the permits. Either way, if they decide to permit me or not, I will lobby for them to be placed together regardless of where they ulitmately end up. They are doing well. They are eating us out of house and home. We brought in some road killed deer from the DEC so they wouldn't deplete our food supply for the rest of our birds for the winter. They are doing a good job of cleaning up the deer. We are planning to enlarge their current enclosure to widen it hopefully this summer. My husband Tim and I have been working out the details on how we can accomplish it without reducing the strength of the roof should we ever get snow in the winter again. All of the other birds are doing well also. The Great Horns were singing all night the other night. It was beautiful to hear. Our female will sing back to me if I call to her from the house. She's a real character. I'll update as I hear more.

Nothing after but I wrote to them.