Good evening all,
After the current spate of Wedge-tailed Eagle
sightings over suburban Belconnen I would like to share a small secret that has
been kept to myself and the raptor researchers at the University of Canberra.
For quite a few years in the past I had noticed W-t E over the Kaleen, Mitchell
area and was informed by staff at CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems that the birds
were responsible for killing and eating some of the captive Tammar Wallabies
held on the CSIRO grounds. Several years ago my back fence neighbour, a former
solder who was working at the Belconnen Navy radio transmitting station asked
me if I was interested in the location of a Wedgie nest that was in the line of
Pinus radiata trees that are
found on the ridgeline of the old transmission station. I found this a bit hard
to believe as the nest was no more than about 200m from houses in Kaleen. I
contacted Jerry Olsen and Esteban Fuentes and asked if they knew of this nest –
they didn’t but promptly went to investigate. Sure enough the nest
contained 1 young eagle which they promptly banded. I gather talking to my
neighbour that the adults were feeding the young bird on kangaroo joeys. They
would harass the adult female ‘roos that had pouched young, no mean feat
given all the cables holding the transmission towers up, and forced them to “dump”
the joey. Bingo, enough tucker to keep the young eagle happy. The chick did
fledge but in very poor wet and windy weather and we are not sure if it
survived. At the time my neighbour and his colleagues counted over 300
kangaroos in the fenced in base – maybe the eagles were keeping their
number in check. There are certainly a lot more there now.
I think it is safe to let the secret out as the birds
have not been seen there for quite a while and the old nest is rapidly falling
down. With all the recent reports I suggest people keep a close eye on just
where these current birds are hanging about – you may have a nest quite
close and not know it. I have a small property near Lake
George which has a recently built wedgie nest on it. It is also about
150 m from one house on a neighbouring property and 200 from another. This chick
was also fed mainly on kangaroo. The species will breed at any time of the year
given a reasonable abundance of food, something I learned from Esteban.
Mark
