DEC 31: 7:15 AM New female "Glory" briefly joined Pride

[NewMexiKen]

Philip Martin sends this message with an excellent photo of the new female.

Hi Ken,

I was at the nest at 07:00 this morning and found Pride perched in the Melaleuca trees.  

At approximately 07:15 "Glory", the young female, flew by him and perched south and to the west of Pride.  She remained for approximately 5 minutes.  There was no interaction and she departed to the south/east.

If she is the new girl in Pride's life I'm gonna call her Glory.  Pride & Glory

Happy New Year!!

Phil

[NewMexiKen]

Sorry, Phil's beautiful photo did not load the first time. He mentioned that this bird look more like a male, and I do agree-- especially seeing them side to side. The younger bird has a more tapered body and just looks smaller too.

 Here it is:

[NewMexiKen]

Looking at the photo, can we be sure this is the same female that first appeared with Pride at the nest on December 8th? Here is one of my photos.

If anyone has better photos from earlier, please let us know. Carefully observe and photograph any eagles that appear besides Pride so that we may compare them. Phil, did you get any other views,particularly of tail pattern? As you observed, this bird's body shape looks male rather than female.

Notice the difference in bill color and the amount of dark feathers on this eagle's head. There is a more distinct "Osprey" eye line* and the base of the bill is dark as opposed to the bright yellow bill expected in a 5th year (4 year old) Bald Eagle. Not sure, but the tail feathers give a darker appearance. This bird seems to have more white on its chest.

It may actually be a 4th year bird rather than the early 5th year that we first saw. the bill color is rather distinctly different>

ADDENDUM: I did not mean to say this is an Osprey-- the dark line through the eye is sometimes called the "Osprey line" because it bears some resemblance to the Osprey. It is one of the last features to fade away when the bird gets to be 4 years old.

December 8 bird (on the right-- compare bill color to Pride's-- they are the same):



Phil's photo from today:

[JLD_photography]

I take those pics Dec. 7 I hope can help you guys

[Lisa G]

I don't think it is the same female we seen on December 07, 2014 .. this looks like another Eagle and we agreed not to name the new Eagle until we know that they are going to mate and me & Ken will have a naming contest for them :)

[NewMexiKen]

Yes, Lisa, this is a different and younger eagle, and also may be a male, judging by its size and shape. As we agreed earlier (and for the benefit of others who are interested in giving a name to Pride's eventual mate), if a new female becomes established at this nest, we will hold a two stage poll. First we will collect "nominations" of names from both this FORUM and your Facebook page (the link is in your post). Then we will hold an independent open poll so that participants all over the globe can vote on the final name, whether or not they are registered on Facebook or this FORUM or neither. Only one vote will be allowed per IP address. If no single name gets a plurality, we will need to have a second "runoff" to select among the 3-5 names that get the most votes in the first poll. We handled it this way for two years when middle school students set up a poll to name the eaglets those times. It worked very well and we got hundreds of votes from all over the country.  Thanks!

Let's just hope that the pair gets settled down and starts spending more time together. I fear that the window for breeding has already passed this year, so the naming process may need to wait until next September or October when/if a pair once again starts setting up housekeeping at this nest.

[NewMexiKen]

Those are wonderful shots, JLD! These are images of the "first" female that has been accompanying Pride. Everyone should study them and compare with any other eagles that may visit the nest while the domestic life of Pride is in turmoil. There have been two visitors with white heads (a 4th year male and a 5th year female as shown in your photos, plus a younger dark immatue that has some white on the top of its head, probably a 3rd year Bald Eagle).

Everyone, try to describe and photograph and report any new visitors so that we may try to interpret what is going on at the nest now that Joy has been missing so long.

Good news-- I got the spreadsheet program working again and have uploaded an updated "Eagle Milestone" report at this link:  http://www.rosyfinch.com/EagleMilestonesSheet.pdf

Thanks!