Pick-up Sticks, Bald Eagle Style

On a recent Sunday morning I found my self perched on the side of a hill overlooking the Connecticut River.

Two Audubon volunteers and two Vermont Fish and Wildlife employees were there to look for sticks. Specifically, they were there to look for sticks between one inch and three inches in diameter, and one foot to eight feet long. Sticks of this size are what bald eagles use to make their nests.

A pair of bald eagles had nested on the hillside last summer. They were the first pair of bald eagles to successfully nest in Vermont in at least 50 years, and possibly more. But in the fall, the towering pine that held their nest fell. Bald eagles can take an entire summer to build a nest. The Fish and Wildlife department was eager to keep the eagles in Vermont (tempting nest sites lie just across the river in New Hampshire) and to keep this pair nesting to help restore bald eagles to the region.

The two Fish and Wildlife employees used their chainsaws to remove some saplings. Raccoons had raided the previous nest, perhaps by climbing similar saplings. One Audubon volunteer scoured the ground around the nest site for sticks of the desired size. The other went to the top of the hill where fallen tree limbs had accumulated – partially due to logging, and possibly due to wind at the edge of a clearing.

It was time for a little participatory journalism.

I climbed the hill and found piles of tree branches of the correct size. But how to move them to down the hill to the nest site?

First, I tried the obvious. I picked up one branch, about six feet long and two inches in diameter and walked down the steep slope. It was tough going. The branch got caught in the trees I passed. Walking with the large stick threw me off balance.

I tried to imagine myself as an eagle, trying to fly with this strange load. Would my grip be stronger as an eagle than as a human? I suspect it might be, to grasp flailing fish. How difficult would lifting this stick in the air be, even if I had a seven foot wingspan? I could only imagine myself in need of a snack and a nap when I was done.

It’s no wonder to me that the eagles can take an entire summer to build their nest.