Where? Where? Wedgie! 2018 Day 14 : 14-05-2018

Wilbur was one of James’ tagged eagles that was killed by a car strike in the first year of the research. James explains in the video that only experienced bird handlers should attempt to pick up injured eagles. 

We headed north today so we could camp close to Bridport to catch a plane over to Cape Barren Island early tomorrow (yes, we’re a bit excited about it!). Along the way we visited two tagged eagles in the hope of spotting them and doing test surveys. 

Walden the Walking Eagle is located on a private farm near Launceston and, being Mothers Day, we decided against knocking on the door and asking if we could access the land. Walden is unusual in that he doesn’t fly much and his tracking data suggests he might even spend some lazy time walking about. That’s why we nicknamed him Walden the Walking Eagle. 

Continuing on towards Scottsdale in north east Tasmania we zeroed I’m on Eli who is a forested area. On one test survey we spotted an eagle briefly and it was doing a manoeuvre called ‘pot hooking’. This is when a male swoops and dives, pulls back up sharply and repeats over and over.  This is a bahaviour often associated with courtship and usually by the male. It probably wasn’t Eli because of his age.

James also spotted an eagle perched in a tree on the ridge line but it was too far away to see if it was Eli or his parents, or another eagle visiting their territory.

Back on the main road we stopped near Wilbur’s unfortunate accident site and found an Eastern quoll carcass next to the road. If you watched our ‘slow down at night’ video last week you might have noticed that we got the message slightly mangled. We meant to say/write ‘slow down from dusk until dawn’, not the other way around!