A bald eagle soars over Cootes Paradise along Hamilton’s Lake Ontario shore. Two bald eagles are nesting in a tall pine and could be making babies, but experts aren’t hopeful they will have eaglets this year.
JIM WILKES/TORONTO STAR
Jim Wilkes Staff Reporter
It appears there won’t be baby bald eagles along Hamilton’s Lake Ontario shore this year.
A young male eagle and his older female mate have been spotted snuggling in a nest atop a tall white pine in Cootes Paradise marsh throughout the spring.
But all that wooing hasn’t resulted in eggs, said Nick Kondrat of Burlington’s Royal Botanical Gardens.
“Judging the behaviour of the eagles, they’re not bringing food back to the nest,” he said.
“They’re not really hanging around as much as they would if there were young ‘uns in the nest.”
The male just might not be ready to deliver the goods, Kondrat said.
“You can tell by its feather patterns that it’s in the stage where it’s maturing into an adult eagle, but hasn’t quite reached that stage yet,” he explained. “We’re looking forward to next year.”
Had the majestic birds produced a brood, their young could have been the first homegrown bald eagles on the lake’s north shore in 50 years.
A century ago, bald eagles were a common sight along Lake Ontario. But toxic pesticides slowly killed off most of the population.
By 1980, only four bald eagle nests remained in southern Ontario, said Tys Theijsmeijer, RBG’s head of natural lands. There are now about 32 nests, including areas north of Toronto and near Peterborough, he said.
The birds, whose wingspan is more than two metres, were first spotted in the area in 2009 and naturalists have been hoping they’d start breeding to replenish the local eagle numbers.
Posted on May 16, 2011 11:54 pm
