DENVER (AP) - A bald eagle is making itself at home in a park in downtown Denver, hunting for fish, ducks and small geese despite the noisy environment.
There’s construction at the nearby Denver Zoo and a robot makes loud sounds to shoo away geese. But bald eagles have a remarkable ability to adapt, federal biologist Kevin Kritz said.
“Some bald eagle pairs are able to come into cities and make a living,” Kritz tolds the Denver Post (https://dpo.st/2hETtMP).
Bald eagles once were imperiled in part because of a pesticide that caused the birds to lay eggs with thin shells. The pesticide DDT now is banned.
Nationwide, bald eagle numbers have grown to an estimated 143,000 birds. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed bald eagles from the list of federally protected threatened and endangered species in 2007.
Eagles usually prove short-time visitors to Denver parks. Eagles aren’t known to nest in City Park, though other lone eagles have hunted there in recent years.
“Some people find it surprising that wildlife can be found in and around the urban areas of Colorado’s fast-growing Front Range,” city Parks and Recreation Administrator Vicki Vargas-Madrid wrote in an email.
More wildlife species are adapting to urban environments as Colorado’s growing population displaces them from natural habitat, she wrote.
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Information from: The Denver Post, https://www.denverpost.com
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