Sign up for chat | Viewing the Decorah Eagles | Viewing the FSV Eagles | Stream Quality issues
Where can I watch the eagles and falcons?
You can watch the Decorah Eagles ads-free, with no membership or ad-blockers, at:
You can watch the Decorah North Eagles ads-free, with no membership or ad-blockers, at:
You can watch the Great Spirit Bluff falcons ads-free, with no membership or ad-blockers, at:
We no longer stream any of our channels to Ustream/IBM Video.
How Do I Sign Up For The New Moderated Chat?
The new chat uses chatroll. You have three choices to log into chat:
- Chatroll! If you already have a Chatroll account, you can log into it to chat at https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/decorah-eagles/. If you don’t have a free Chatroll account, you can sign up for one at https://chatroll-cloud-1.com/.
- Facebook! You can sign into Chatroll with your Facebook account. It is very easy and Chatroll does not post to Facebook on your behalf.
- Twitter! You can sign into Chatroll with your Twitter account. It is very easy and Chatroll does not post to Twitter on your behalf.
Signing in is easy! Go to https://www.raptorresource.org/birdcams/decorah-eagles/ and use your preferred sign-in method under the chat!
Viewing the Decorah Eagles, Decorah North Eagles, and GSB Falcons
The Decorah Eagles, Decorah North Eagles, and GSB Falcons are being streamed via Youtube. All three streams are using HTML5. Go to your device’s app store to get the viewing app for explore.org.
Clearing cache and cookies
If you can’t see one or all of those three streams, refresh the page. If that doesn’t work, clear your cache and cookies, shut the browser, and re-open it to the page you want to watch.
The stream isn’t live on youtube
If you appear to be watching a video instead of a live stream, you probably bookmarked an old stream that is no longer current. Here is how it works. I, a broadcaster, stream a live feed to youtube. Something (an internet outage, a broken internal network, an equipment glitch, etc) stops me from connecting with youtube for four hours or more. When I can finally reconnect, youtube gives my live feed a new url, i.e. it sees it as a completely new feed. My previously live stream is preserved at the original url as a video. So, if you click on an old bookmark, it might direct you to what used to be a stream but is now a video.
The live stream (and latest youtube feed) can always be found by going to our website or Explore.org’s website. If you have an old bookmark that is taking you to a video instead of a live feed, visit our site or Explore’s site and bookmark that. If you really prefer to watch on youtube, visit one of our sites, click the youtube logo on the bottom of the feed, go to youtube, and bookmark that!
If you still can’t see the stream, the most likely possibilities are:
- Your youtube account is set to restricted mode. Read this if a message about ‘Restricted Mode’ appears where the video should be. Or:
- Your browser or app doesn’t support HTML5. Read this if you are seeing a hazy screen that resembles white, grey, or black noise, but no message. Or:
- Your browser or app doesn’t accept third party cookies (and a few other issues). Read this.
Restricted Mode
You need to disable youtube’s restricted mode. If you have a home computer, follow these instructions: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/174084?co=GENIE.Platform%3DiOS. If you are accessing through work or school, you may need to have an IT person or system administrator help you.
No support for HTML5
If you are seeing a hazy grey screen that resembles white, grey, or black noise, your browser or app is most likely not compatible with HTML5. To test, follow this link to our stream page at https://www.raptorresource.org/embed-test/ and note which of the three streams you can see.
If you can’t see streams #1 or #3, visit https://www.youtube.com/html5 to see whether your browser supports html5. If your browser is not compatible, we strongly suggest upgrading. Adobe is end-of-lifing Flash, our former presentation method, in 2020. Many newer browsers have very uneven support for Flash!
Third-party cookies, privacy seetings, compatibility mode, and youtube blocking
If your browser should support HTML5 but you still can’t see the Decorah Eagles, the Decorah North Eagles, or the GSB Falcons, check your third party cookie and privacy settings. You can also check to see whether youtube is blocked on your computer. If you have IE, check your compatibility mode. If you have the compatibility mode turned on, try turning compatibility off, adjusting your settings, or watching live at youtube: https://youtu.be/R4b_1rUNCUY.
If that doesn’t work, post in our support forum (you will need an account if you don’t have one): https://www.raptorresource.org/forum/index.php?board=55.0
Can I watch your streams on my phone or tablet?
You can! You can use your browser or download the Explore and Youtube apps. To download, go to your device’s store and search for Youtube and Explore. Download and install the free apps and start watching! I’ve been able to watch the stream via an IPad, an IPhone, an Android phone, and Gen 10 Kindle Fire.
You will need to use your device’s browser to chat.
Device and Computer Issues: Xcel Energy Birds of Prey
I can’t see any Xcel Energy Birds of Prey
Make sure you are watching the eagles here or here.
Security Warnings
Our website forces https, which means that all connections between the server and your browser are encrypted. The Decorah Eagles, Decorah North Eagles, and GSB Falcons streams are all served via https, but some content on our forum is not. Click the shield to allow http content on raptorresource.org. We aren’t collecting data from you, so the lack of encryption shouldn’t be an issue.
Mixed content warning. The Xcel FSV eagle stream is served via http, not https, but our website forces https. Conflict!
Final Steps
If you have solved plug-in and mixed content issues and still can’t see the FSV eagles, try clearing your Flash cookies. These locally stored objects weren’t removed when you cleared your cache. To clear them, follow this link. Once you have reached the Flash Player help page, click the Delete All Sites button, followed by the Confirm button. Close the browser, re-open the browser, and try again.
If none of these steps work, you may have a more complicated problem.
- Are you using Net Nanny or a similar piece of software to mediate online interactions between your family or students and the internet? Check the settings to make sure they allow participation.
Choppy Stream and Stream Quality Issues
The stream is super-choppy. Why?
There could be more than one reason for that:
Bandwidth: At my house, a choppy stream is usually due to low bandwidth, especially during evenings and weekends. As shown in the image below, youtube allows you to manually select the resolution that best meets your bandwidth. Click the HD button just below the stream to access your options. Drop it down to 360 or even 240p to reduce bandwidth consumption, or throw caution to the wind and see if you can stream at 720p or 1080p!
Hardware Acceleration: Thanks to 7streetoak for this tip! Browser-based hardware acceleration can impact stream quality. If it is on, try disabling it.
Facebook Issues
I follow you on Facebook, but I’m not getting your notifications and posts. Why?
Make sure per the image at right that you are signed up to receive notifications in your newsfeed. If you are, comment on one of our threads – even with just one word! – and we’ll be back in your news feed. Keep commenting and sharing pictures and posts to keep seeing us. Facebook algorithms no longer show content that people don’t interact with, as documented here: http://bit.ly/1JLx5D5 and here: http://slate.me/1ReLjWx. Limiting your news feed to things you are interacting with makes your feed more rewarding and reduces your changes of encountering a bot that scams you, gives you malware, or locks up your hard drive.
This SUPER-ANNOYING Facebook pop-up won’t let me see your page unless I have a Facebook page too! It didn’t used to be that way…
The all-caps annoyed person is me. I am ALL-CAPS ANNOYED that Facebook is spamming people with a register screen if they aren’t logged into Facebook. This is a new thing and not something we have control over, although we did file a ticket with Facebook to complain (in a polite non-caps way). We are a business page and as such are supposed to be available to the public, Facebook or not.
To block the pop-up, add adblockplus to your browser if you don’t already have it. Ad-block currently has a version for all of the big browsers used on standard Macs and PCs. Add these two lines to your filter:
www.facebook.com#dialog_0
www.facebook.com###pagelet_growth_expanding_cta
Don’t know how to add filters? Check this tutorial out: https://adblockplus.org/getting_started#add-subscription. This will not remove the option to register or login at the top of the page, but it will stop the pop-up from covering the page.
If you aren’t interested in blocking the pop-up, you can reduce it. Try pressing the escape key when it pops up. If it doesn’t go away, click the x on the right-hand side to reduce it (outlined inside the red circle below). We will also be posting news and video round-ups on this website.
The ‘X’ is non-ADA compliant for contrast, which is why it is so hard to see. We made sure to notify Facebook of this problem as well.
We hope you enjoy watching this year!
The Raptor Resource Project