PORTLAND, Maine—The eagle has landed—on chickens and rare birds, with talons at the ready.
The resurgence of the bald eagle is one of America’s greatest conservation success stories. They have come back so strong that in some areas, they are interfering with efforts to preserve more jeopardized species, such as loons and cormorants, wildlife biologists say. And their proliferation is leading to encounters at livestock farms that sometimes end badly—and illegally—for the eagles.
Federal protections mean farmers can do little to keep them away, said Ken Klippen, a poultry scientist and former farmer who heads the National Association of Egg Farmers.
“It’s a fully protected bird. If you have foxes, coyotes, raccoons, a farmer can do something about that,” he said. “But if it’s a bald eagle? His hands are tied.”
The Pennsylvania Game Commission investigated a case in which an eagle was shot dead in the East Penn Township area in 2015. In Steuben County, New York, a sheep farmer and two other people were accused of poisoning sheep carcasses to kill eagles that threatened lambs. And authorities investigated suspicious deaths of 18 bald eagles in Maryland and Delaware last year.
Bald eagles were chosen as an American symbol in 1782 and underwent a steep decline in the early and middle 20th century, pushed to the brink of extinction by pesticides, habitat loss and indiscriminate hunting.
A 1930 issue of Popular Science stated that the birds had died off so much that it was possible they would soon “be seen only on coins and the coat of arms of the United States unless drastic action” saved them.
Such action came in the form of federal protections, including the 1940 Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, which prevents almost everyone from so much as disturbing the birds and still stands today. The eagles recovered so much that they were removed from the endangered species list in 2007.
