Just when Missouri’s bald eagle population was thriving again, the slaughter started
By Don Corrigan
Imagine shimmying up a 100-foot rope to a bird nest high above a rocky riverbank to band an eaglet. Missouri conservation agents have been risking life and limb for decades to bring back the state’s bald eagle population.
As an occasional outdoor scribe who has scaled bluffs and rappelled off cliffs in pursuit of authentic firsthand stories, I feel their pain. Yet I know less than an inkling of what it’s like for agents to climb into a nest 7 feet wide and 10 feet deep, far above terra firma.
Little wonder that the climbing wildlife professionals take it real personal when Missouri’s bald eagles are found shot dead or poisoned.
“It does hurt to see this happen,” says Larry Yamnitz, protection field chief for the Missouri Department of Conservation. “These birds are a beautiful asset for the state. They are not the kind of predators who present a nuisance to anybody.
“All of our conservation agents are involved in protecting the eagles, monitoring the species, counting the nests,” adds Yamnitz. “I started 25 years ago, and it has been great to see nesting areas reestablished in Missouri. We can’t go backward.”
Ah, but we can go backward in Missouri. Last year was marked by a rash of eagle killings in Reynolds, Gasconade and Pulaski counties and along the Mississippi River. The deaths in the aggregate have officials especially alarmed.
Yamnitz tells me the destruction of the eagles is deliberate, noting that rifles were used and almost certainly fired from camouflaged areas. Eagles have eyesight eight times superior to that of human beings. They don’t sit still for close-up hits or stalking.
When you have wildlife crimes, there’s no next of kin to help with clues and leads, Yamnitz adds pointedly. Native Americans saw bald eagles as sacred birds, protectors of the people. American settlers must have had similar ideas, for in 1782 they made the eagle our national emblem.
But descendants of the settlers have not always regarded bald eagles with the same reverence as Native Americans. The bald eagle was nearly wiped out in the last century through destruction of its habitat, excessive hunting and use of harmful chemicals such as DDT.
The Missouri eagle population hit rock bottom in the 1960s, and state conservationists and naturalists launched a painstaking program to bring nesting birds back, protect migrating birds and clean up and preserve their habitat.
The program has paid off. Although the bald eagle remains an endangered species, more than 2,000 of the birds now winter along the Mississippi River and other Missouri watersheds. According to MDC ornithologist Andy Forbes, during some recent migration years, Missouri has been second only to Alaska in the number of wintering bald eagles. “A lot depends on the ice pack north of here,” he notes. “We counted 2,500 eagles in the state last year. They are easily seen below dams on the Mississippi, where fish are stunned or killed in the turbines, and the turbulence below the spillway keeps water open for the eagles for their hunting.”
Several eagle pairs (the birds mate for life) have made permanent homes here. John Solodar, bird-trip coordinator for the St. Louis Audubon Society, reports that the society has counted about 60 nesting eagle pairs that now stay in Missouri all year long.
“We’ve seen as many as 300 eagles feasting on easy pickings at the Alton Dam,” Solodar adds. “It’s a shame there are rogues out there who would shoot these magnificent birds.”
Rogues, indeed. How strange that in this time when our patriotic fervor is kicked into overdrive, eagles are in the crosshairs. What an outrage that even as former Missouri Gov. John Ashcroft is belting out “Let the Eagle Soar,” lowlifes in this state are aiming to make our precious eagles’ blood and feathers fly.
Anyone with information about eagle killings should contact the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Eagle killings may be reported in confidence by calling Operation Game Thief at 800-392-1111.
Eagle Eyes
With the eagle population on the rebound, organized viewing events and “eagle days” are becoming a part of Missouri and Metro East tourism. Whether soaring on 8-foot wingspans or diving for fish at 30 to 50 mph, eagles draw crowds even in temperatures well below freezing.
Eagle-viewing events are held at Bagnell Dam at the Lake of the Ozarks, Truman Lake, Table Rock Lake and Missouri River sites south and west of Columbia and in nearby Clarksville. However, the most dependable viewing is north of St. Louis, along the Mississippi River. Organized viewing tours on selected days are now scheduled from December 22 through February 22 out of the Pere Marquette State Park Visitor Center, near Grafton, Ill.
