Wildlife Center Releases Bald Eagle on September 18

      The Wildlife Center of Virginia, the nation’s leading teaching and research hospital for native wildlife, released a Bald Eagle on Friday, September 18 at 1:00 p.m. at Westover Plantation, on the James River in Charles City County.        Participating in the release was Ed Clark, President and Co-Founder of the Wildlife Center.  Assisting Clark was Madis Leivits, a veterinary student from Estonia who has just started a one-year internship at the Center.     

Madis and Ed, photo courtesy of Lee Skluzak

     Also participating in the release were Virginia Tech reseachers, led by David Kramer, who initially rescued the eagle.       This juvenile Bald Eagle hatched earlier this year in a nest along the North Fork of the Shenandoah River in Warren County.  Virginia Tech researchers who were working on an eaglet banding project found this bird on May 20 in the nest and suspected an injury to the bird’s right leg.  They transported the bird to the Wildlife Center in Waynesboro.        Upon admission, the eagle received a complete examination.  Center veterinarians found a fracture in the eagle’s right leg [tibiotarsus] and also some bruising on its sternum [suggesting that the bird had been lying down and not using its legs].  On May 21, Dr. Elizabeth Daut operated on the eagle, inserting pins to secure the fracture in the bird’s leg.  Surgery went well, and the eagle spent several days recuperating in the Center’s critical care chamber. 

Eagle in critical-care chamber after surgery

     By mid-June, the bird was housed outdoors; at the end of June, the Center veterinary team determined that the leg fracture was healing well and began removing the implanted pins.         On August 3, the eagle was placed in one of the Center’s largest flight pens.  The Center rehabilitation staff veterinary team exercised the bird to build up its stamina, and the eagledemonstrated that it was ready for return to the wild.         The eagle was released at Westover [ca. 1730] across the James River from a National Wildlife Refuge.  The 4,200-acre refuge was created in 1991 and hosts one of the largest eagle roosts on the East Coast.        The eagle released on September 18 is one of the 33 Bald Eagles admitted to the Wildlife Center thus far in 2009.   The all-time record for eagle admissions was set in 2007, when the Center admitted a total of 36 Bald Eagles.        It is estimated that the Bald Eagle population of North America numbered about half a million before European settlement.  With the loss of habitat, shooting, and the effects of DDT and other pesticides, the U.S. eagle population plummeted.  In 1977, there were fewer than 50 Bald Eagle nests in Virginia.         Today, the Bald Eagle population in Virginia is on the rebound.  There are now more than 600 active Bald Eagle nests in the Commonwealth. 

Photo courtesy of Lee Skluzak

      Every year, about 2,500 animals – ranging from Bald Eagles to opossums to chipmunks – are brought to the Wildlife Center for care.  “The goal of the Center is to restore our patients to health and return as many as possible to the wild,” Clark said.  “At the Wildlife Center, we treat to release.”          Since its founding in 1982, the nonprofit Center has cared for more than 53,000 wild animals, representing 200 species of native birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibians.  The Center’s public education programs share insights gained through the care of injured and orphaned wild animals, in hopes of reducing human damage to wildlife.  The Center trains veterinary and conservation professionals from all over the world and is actively involved in comprehensive wildlife health studies and the surveillance of emerging diseases.

Photo courtesy of Lee Skluzak