Wall Street Journal (WSJ), 02.20.2022, Books Section
It’s commonly believed that Benjamin Franklin would have preferred the wild turkey as America’s national bird. In a letter addressed to his daughter, he branded the bald eagle a “rank coward” and a bird of “bad moral character” because it feeds on the meat of dead animals and steals food from other birds—particularly the honest osprey.
Franklin was, of course, anthropomorphizing the wild birds by the moral standards of his time, a misguided practice that continues to this day. It is only through the human lens that a pig is greedy, a donkey stubborn or a fox sly.
Then there’s John James Audubon, our most famous ornithologist and the author of the enduring “Birds of America.” Audubon found the bald eagle to be cowardly and tyrannical. “Suffer me, kind reader,” he wrote, “to say how much I grieve that [the bald eagle] should have been selected as the Emblem of my Country.” Audubon killed a great many balds with his beloved fowling gun, and pronounced the eaglets he procured after taking their parents as “good eating, the flesh resembling veal in taste and tenderness.”
Historically, Americans have had a violently bifurcated attitude toward the eagle—venerating it as a national symbol “representing fidelity, self-reliance, strength, and courage” while all but exterminating the creature itself. For almost as long as Europeans have been on this continent, eagles have risked their lives flying across American skies. As early as the 1660s, the settlers of Casco Bay, Maine, were shooting the birds to feed their hogs. Cash bounties were paid for eagle talons throughout the 19th century, a practice that continued in Alaska until 1952, when it was finally outlawed.
From time immemorial there have been stories about eagles carrying off human babies. The problem is that the real bird maxes out at about 14 pounds (for a very large female, which, on average, is 20% larger than a male) and can’t lift more than half its weight. An eagle’s bread and butter is fish, although there are stories of eagles carrying off small cats.
It took the Bald Eagle Protection Act of 1940, which prohibited the taking of eagles or disturbing them in any way, to help bring the bird back from the brink.
Scientific name: Haliaeetus leucocephalus
Wingspan: 5.9 – 7.5 ft. (Adult)
Conservation status: Population increasing, >300,000
Lifespan: 20 years (In the wild)
Mass: 6.6 – 14 lbs
Speed: 75 – 99 mph (Diving)
Nest: The largest of any bird, some can weigh up to 2000 lbs
I have a very good friend that is a falconer, and he has both a Golden and a Bald in his care.
For those of you who know Johnny Barrett from STK days, I helped arrange having my friend bring both his eagles to Johnny's sons eagle scout ceremony!
Considering current US potus performance in world affairs perhaps the baldy is the correct choice.
Very interesting and informative read, thanks
Updated my knowledge ... thank you!