EAGLE LIFE STORY

• “WE ARE NOT WHERE WE WANT TO BE”

The Story of an EAGLE:

The Eagle has the longest life-span of its species. It can live up to 70 years.

But to reach this age, the eagle must make a very difficult decision!

In its 40th year, the eagle’s long and flexible Talons can no longer grab a prey which serves as food.

Its long and sharp beak becomes bent.

Its old-aged and heavy wings, due to their thick feathers, stick to its chest and make it difficult to fly.

Then, the eagle is left with only two options: DIE or go through a painful process of CHANGE!

This process lasts for 150 days (5 months)

The process requires the eagle to fly to a mountain top and sit on its nest. There the eagle knocks its beak against a rock until it plucks it out.

Then the eagle will wait for the new beak to grow back after which it will pluck out its talons. When its talons grow back, the eagle starts plucking its old-aged feathers.

And after this, the eagle takes its famous flight of rebirth and LIVES for 30 more years!!

Why is Change needed?

To survive and live. We too have to start the change process.

We sometimes need to get rid of the unpleasant old memories, negative habits and our fixed mindset.

Only freed from the past burdens can we take advantage of the present.

If an eagle can make a lifesaving and life-changing decision at the age of 40….why can’t we?

In order to take on a New Journey ahead, let go of your negative old limiting beliefs.

Open up your mind and let yourself fly high like an eagle!

When it rains, all birds occupy shelter. But the EAGLE avoids the rain by flying above the clouds…

The problem is common to all but the attitude to solve it makes the difference!

Don’t be afraid of change…accept it gracefully  

BALD EAGLE

INTRODUCTION :

The bald eagle is the only eagle native solely to North America. It is the national bird of the United States. Like all hawks and eagles, the bald eagle is a bird of prey belonging to the family Accipitridae of the order Falconiformes. Its scientific name is Haliaeetus leucocephalus.

Bald eagles live in the United States, Canada, and northern Mexico. A type of sea eagle, they typically live near water. Bald eagles are commonly found inland along rivers and large lakes.

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS

The adult male bald eagle is about 36 inches (90 centimeters) long and has a wingspan of 6.6 feet (2 meters). Females grow somewhat larger than males. A female bald eagle may reach 43 inches (108 centimeters) in length and have a wingspan of 8 feet (2.5 meters). Both sexes are dark brown, with a white head and tail. The bird is not actually bald. Its name comes from its strikingly noticeable white-feathered head. The beak, eyes, and feet are yellow. Like other birds of prey, the bald eagle has a hooked beak and sharp claws, called talons.

DIET

Bald eagles eat mostly fish, when available. The birds pluck fish out of the water with their talons. Bald eagles sometimes follow seabirds as a means of locating fish. The eagles also rob ospreys, a type of large hawk, of their fish. Besides live fish, bald eagles prey on other birds, small mammals, snakes, turtles, and crabs. They also eat dead animals.

LIFE CYCLE

The bald eagle’s nest is a large platform of sticks. The birds usually build the nest atop a large, isolated tree or high rock that is located within easy flight of water. A female lays two or three eggs, which take slightly longer than a month to hatch. Both parents share in the incubation and feeding of the young. The immature birds are brown with whitish tail and wing linings. The pure white head and tail feathers do not appear until the birds are four to five years old.

CONSERVATION

Bald eagles were declared the U.S. national bird in 1782. There may have been hundreds of thousands of bald eagles then. Over time, however, human activities caused bald eagle numbers to drop. People hunted bald eagles for sport and because they thought the birds were a threat to livestock and fishing. By the mid-1900s hunters had killed many thousands of bald eagles. To help the birds, the U.S. government passed the Bald Eagle Protection Act of 1940. The law made it illegal to kill bald eagles.

The bald eagle population continued to decline, though, mainly because the chemical pesticide DDT came into wide use. Farmers sprayed DDT on their fields to kill insect pests that harmed crops. However, DDT had toxic effects on other living things, too. Levels of the pesticide built up in the bodies of prey animals, including fish. Bald eagles that ate the contaminated fish were in turn poisoned with DDT. The pesticide interfered with the formation of the birds’ eggshells. Female bald eagles with high DDT levels laid eggs with thin, weak shells that broke easily. Fewer baby bald eagles survived. By 1963, fewer than 450 nesting pairs of bald eagles were left in the wild in the United States (not including Alaska, where the birds were more abundant).

Conservation efforts helped the eagles make a comeback in the late 1900s and early 2000s. In 1972 the U.S. government banned the use of DDT. In 1978 it declared the bald eagle an endangered species in all but a few of the northernmost states. By the late 1980s, these measures had enabled bald eagles to replenish their numbers in the wild. The U.S. government reclassified the bald eagle from endangered to threatened status in 1995. At that time, there were about 4,500 nesting pairs in the United States (not including Alaska). By 2000 the population had increased to more than 6,300 pairs. In 2007 the bald eagle was removed from the list of endangered and threatened species.