Monthly Archives: February 2019

Your questions, answered: cold, egg cups, incubation, and nestflix!

02/27/19: DM2 brings in a stick

We have videos below, but we wanted to answer some of your questions first! Why is Mom off her eggs? Is DM2 really helping her? It’s cold – why aren’t they continuously incubating? Is the egg cup big enough? On eggs and incubation: We don’t have any guarantee that all of the eggs will hatch, but embryos can suspend fairly easily and with no damage very early in development. Mom and DM2 have to control for temperature and humidity. This

February 25: So much news and your nightly nestflix round-up!

Decorah Mom sleeping

Will tonight be the night for a second egg at Decorah? Either way, we’ll be celebrating eggs with our first egg fundraiser tomorrow from 8am to 8pm! Join us at our website for chat (https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/decorah-eagles/) or here to hang out, have fun, and talk with other eagleholics in thread. We look forward to seeing you! There was some concern about two things in Decorah today. At one point, the Decorah egglet had blood on it. As alarming as it looked,

February 21, 2019: Nest news and videos!

02/21/19: The Norths on their nest

What a day at all of our nests today! In addition to the first egg at the North Nest, Mr. North showed a juvenile eagle the business end of his talons, DM2 and Mom got busy, and Newman demonstrated some falcon yoga at Great Spirit Bluff! We also have some spectacular close-ups at the Decorah and Decorah North nests.   The accompanying cap shows how quickly the North eagles got their nestbowl and egg cup ready for eggs following yesterday’s

Eggs and cold weather

04/18/18: Mrs. North incubates through the snowstorm

This blog was first published on Wednesday, February 26, 2014. It has been updated to reflect Mom’s new mate and includes some information about the Fort St. Vrain eagles as well. Everyone was worried about the eggs in Decorah back in 2014. Iowa was facing a polar vortex while Mom was laying and incubating eggs. While there have been other cold years, 2014 was one for the record books, with windchills of -50F when Mom laid egg #2. Given that 2019

Where is Eagle D27?

February 18, 2019: D27 Map

Where is eagle D27? Despite the cold weather, she continues to hang out in the Decorah area. She’s spending a lot of time on the Upper Iowa and has been in the vicinity of her natal nest. We hope to go looking for her in the next week or two, since we would love to see how she’s doing and what she looks like! Thanks for the airmail, D27, and please stay safe, warm, and well-fed! I got to thinking

Sunday Night Movies at Decorah North

02/17/19: Geese in Decorah

In Decorah: Hoohooooos at the nest, great fly-ins, snow goggles, DM2 on top, and a flock of geese! At Decorah North: eagles in the snow, a snowy brood patch, and very cool nest visitors. An bald eagle nest can be a nursery, a home, a grocery store, or a Nest Depot for squirrels, mice, and small birds, and a potential real estate location for competitors like owls and other bald eagles. Our camera operators gave us a glimpse at both

Friday night Nestflix and news!

02/14/19: Decorah North

Grab the popcorn and kick back, because we have a whole lot of Friday night Nestflix and a blog on incubation! In Decorah, Mom wants eggs, she and DM2 vocalize and defend the nest, Great Blue Herons appear on Trout Creek, and we get fantastic close-ups. Watch out for those talons! At Decorah North, a squirrel makes a close escape and we get a fantastic fly-in, nestorations, and close-ups. And at GSB, a falcon – Newman, maybe? – perches on

Do bald eagles delay incubation?

February 14, 2019: FSV

This blog was first published on Tuesday, March 29, 2016. It has been updated to reflect new knowledge and events. Do bald eagles delay incubation? It wasn’t an a question we’ve thought about much, since bald eagles in Iowa usually lay eggs in temperatures under – sometimes well under – freezing! However, 2016 was quite a bit warmer, and the eagles in Decorah and Fort St. Vrain seemed to spend more time off the first two eggs than we are used

Friday Nestflix!

February 7, 2019: Mom at N2B

Happy Fri-yay, everyone! Grab the popcorn and look for great close-ups, two food fights, and very cool fly-ins and vocalizations in Decorah, and a pellet casting and nestorations at our Fort St. Vrain nest. thanks to our excellent crew of camera operators and video makers for finding and sharing special moments in the nest with us! Looking for something to do besides watching eagles? We’ve added a prey log feature to our website. To submit your prey observations, go to

NestFlix: Decorah and Decorah North Eagles, February 4, 2019

January 31, 2018: Mom Decorah with rimal feather frosting

Need a break from Monday, or just want to get caught up with the eagles? We’ve got your Nestflix either way! After three days of intense cold, things warmed up and we started seeing a little more of them again! In Decorah, we have nestorations, great vocalizations, a frosty-headed DM, and Mom’s frosty ‘eyelashes’ (actually rimal feathers). At Decorah North, we get a very cool look at DNF with a squirrel, a great look at a Red-Bellied Woodpecker trying to