JUNE 17: Both eagles in nest area

[NewMexiKen]

This morning I observed the nest for about one hour, from 8:00 AM to 9:00.  I heard one eaglet calling in the area east of the nest along SW 208th Avenue as soon as I got out of the car. It was quite close to the east end of the wooded area which contains the nest. I searched for a bit there and then walked to watch the Nest.

One juvenile was on the nest and I thought that a second was hidden in the foliage above the nest, but I could not confirm this and cannot say whether a second eagle had moved after I first heard it.. The one on the nest was calling fairly frequently, and its calls were answered by an unseen eaglet to the  east about where I heard first before I got to the nest.

They were calling at irregular intervals. I’m quite certain that this individual on the nest is the presumed male (based upon smaller gape size and darker plumage) which remained on the nest most of the time and also it was doing the most calling. The other bird  remained off to the east out of sight. The calls of the two eaglets are somewhat different. That of the presumed male seems to be high pitched in quite shrill and rather urgent. That of the female is a bit lower pitched and not quite as sharp. The male did most of the calling and the female only answered a few times but did appear to move in from the far east end of the wooded nest tree area.

Before departing I walked the whole length of the eastern edge of the woods but I did not hear the female call again.



No adults were present in the nest area. Out on the wetlands of west Miramr this morning, one adult flew quite low overhead just 10 minutes before sunrise, at 6:19 AM.