Internet providing window into bald eagles' nest

BY JAMES BRUGGERS Contra Costa Times

A tiny camera, solar power and Internet technology are letting people from around the world virtually climb into a bald eagle nest in Massachusetts and watch a pair raise their newly hatched eaglet.

People watched on local access TV and the World Wide Web as the pair returned Jan. 30 to their nest 100 miles west of Boston, bringing sticks in their claws to repair winter damage. They watched as the female laid two eggs in March, and as one of them hatched on Easter Sunday. They've seen the parents scoop out soiled nest material and replace it with fresh grass and pine needles, and bring food back to the nest: Usually fish, but one time a duck.

Wednesday, after the youngster moved behind a branch and out of view, calls of concern started ringing in from Texas, Georgia and Florida to Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge along the Connecticut River. Instead of a baby eagle, all people could see in the nest was a dead
fish.

``They were asking, ``Where's the chick? Where's the chick?'' said Carolyn Boardman, who works at the refuge and came up with the ``eaglecam'' idea. ``They're really concerned.''

Boardman is pleased with public interest. The effort is a project of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the state of Massachusetts and the Northeast Utilities power company, which owns the island to which the nesting eagles have returned since 1989.

``It's cool,'' she said.

Schools, homes and even bars are turning their televisions to the eagle channel. There, they can even
hear the big predatory birds' harsh, creaking cackles.  Now word is getting out that anyone with access to the World Wide Web can see photographs, updated every 15 minutes, as well as a library of pictures. It's a natural setting -- no manmade lights -- so at night the screen goes black.

Intrigued, Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt will visit the refuge Monday.

This is just the latest example of how computer technology is taking more people to places they've never been before, and sometimes helping people better understand the natural world.

The Cincinnati Zoo also has put a camera in an eagles' nest. So did another wildlife refuge in upstate New York. What's new is the two Massachusetts eagles can be followed in Walnut Creek or Paris or Hong Kong.

There's a plan afoot for live Internet broadcasts from all national marine sanctuaries, said Ken Peterson, spokesman for the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which operates an Internet ``kelpcam'' in its kelp forest exhibit.

Vice President Al Gore wants a space camera focused on Earth to beam a steady stream of video back home.

``Depending on where the cameras are pointed,'' Peterson said, "they can be a very good
educational tool.''

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