Pittsburgh’s most prolific parents are rewarming their love nest.
The Audubon Society of Western Pennsylvania confirmed Friday that a bald eagle pair living on a steep hillside in Hays are incubating an egg laid at 6:22 p.m. If the birds’ family history continues, the egg will likely be the first of several laid this nesting season.
Rachel Handel, Audubon spokeswoman, said that for days staff had been watching the birds cushion their 5-foot nest of woven sticks with soft bedding, a sign that mating had been successful. The raptors have been nesting on the same hillside, high above the Monongahela River inside the Pittsburgh city limits, since 2013 and have successfully hatched eaglets in all of those years except 2015. Ms. Handel characterized these particular birds as experienced, cooperative parents.
“Bald eagles on average lay two eggs per year, but this pair has laid three eggs in a season five times. Two of those times, including in 2021, all three eggs hatched and the eaglets successfully fledged the nest,” she said. “The adults work well together, taking turns incubating the eggs. This is the 10th season that they’ve nested and laid eggs, so they are experienced parents.”
And they’re starting their new family right on time. Last year their first egg was laid Feb. 12, a second came Feb. 15, and a third and final egg was dropped Feb. 19. Two eggs hatched March 23 and the third on March 27. The eaglets fledged in June.
Handel said the parents’ behaviors will change now that there is an egg in the nest. One of the adults will remain in the nest at all times, warming the egg with its body to protect and incubate it. When the caretaker bird stands, the egg is visible in the nest bowl. Sometimes the parent rolls the egg to maintain a consistent temperature before lying across it again to continue incubation. The other parent will make frequent food runs, and the adults will occasionally switch roles.
The public can view livestreaming video of the nest site via a new camera installed on Dec. 10. Day and nighttime video, a full timeline of Hays nest activities and additional information is posted on the Audubon website. The Hays webcam is a collaborative project of PixCams, the Audubon Society and associated partners, operating on the authority of the state Game Commission.
Several active bald eagle nests are located in the Pittsburgh region. But with no cameras on the sites less is known about what’s happening within the nest bowls.
In 2010, when a bald eagle nest was spotted on an isolated hillside on private property near Crescent, it was seen as a sort of environmental milestone — nature's confirmation that Allegheny County had cleaned up its act.
A year after the Hays pair settled in Pittsburgh, another couple chased a pair of red-tailed hawks from their long-time nesting site on a steep bluff overlooking the Allegheny River near Harmar. Audubon bought the property and set up camera surveillance, but twice the birds have relocated to stronger trees on the same cliff just beyond the camera’s view.
“While the Harmar bald eagles are no longer nesting on Audubon-owned property, there is still value in having purchased the property,” said Ms. Handel. “Any acreage acquired gives us the potential to increase habitat value for local birds and wildlife. It’s always possible, since the Harmar eagles have moved so many times in the past, that the birds will return to that land.”
From 2019-20, an eagle couple tried but failed to start a family in North Park, and last year the female was struck by a truck and killed along the nearby Pennsylvania Turnpike. In February 2021, the younger male was spotted with a new companion, a juvenile female whose approximate age was determined by the absence of white feathers on her head. She’s apparently too young to, well, go steady, but in January the couple was seen flying over North Park Lake.
An active bald eagle nest overlooks the Monongahela River near Glassport. More bald eagle nests are active throughout southwestern Pennsylvania, including home base for a couple of avian rock stars that draw crowds at Canonsburg Lake in Washington County.
John Hayes: jhayes@post-gazette.com.
First Published: February 12, 2022, 1:44 a.m.