Bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)

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This species account provides in detail the known information about the bald eagle's life history, including its distribution, migration, habitat, food habits, sounds, behavior, and breeding. The bald eagle has undergone dramatic population fluctuations over the past two centuries. The bird became rare in the mid- to late 1900s in the contiguous United States as persecution by humans greatly reduced survival and pesticides, primarily DDT, significantly lowered reproduction. Populations have increased dramatically since 1980 as DDT levels dropped and breeding productivity returned to pre-DDT levels across many parts of the bird's range, and as human persecution decreased with increasing environmental awareness. This recovery represents one of the continent’s most successful conservation stories. The bald eagle is one of the most studied North American birds, with well over 2,000 individual articles on various aspects of its biology and management.

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Full Citation: Buehler, David A. 2000. Bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus). No. 506 in: The Birds of North America: life histories for the 21st Century. Alan Poole and F. Gill, editors. Philadelphia: The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia and the American Ornithologists' Union. 40 pp.

Location: Wildlife Bureau Reference Shelves. See also: W00BUE01IDUS; this species account has become a living one at http://bna.birds.cornell.edu/bna/species/506/, where changes, additions, revisions can be made at any time.

From BNA: "The purpose of BNA being online is so that the content can be continually updated; therefore we discourage you from printing static copies, in case the information changes."