These white-tailed eagle young are almost fully grown and not very happy about being measured and weighed by the researchers. The largest white-tailed eagles can
be a metre long and have a wingspan of up to 265 cm. They are northern Europe’s largest bird of prey.
The dry branches creak ominously as Trond
Johnsen from the Norwegian Institute for
Nature Research (NINA) climbs into the six-
metre-high coastal pine. Master’s student Silja
Sletten from the Department of Arctic and
Marine Biology at UiT protects her colleague
as best she can with ropes and other climbing
equipment, but it still looks risky. It doesn’t help
that the goal of climb is a large eagle’s nest in the
top of the tree, where an irritated young white-
tailed eagle looks out over the edge. Above
us circle worried eagle parents, periodically
screeching out warnings to the intruders.
“We’ve been up in quite a few eagle nests in
recent years, but have never had an eagle parent
attack us,” Johnsen said reassuringly on our trip
through the woods to find the nest.
“They probably realise that people can be
dangerous, and their top priority is to stay alive.
But they won’t hesitate to attack a fox, for exam-
ple, if it tries approach their young.”
Old nests
Up in the nest, a young eagle is looking down
at the unfamiliar man getting closer. Even from
the bottom of the hill, it is clear that we’re not
talking about small birds here. By early July, the
young birds are only one to two weeks from
being able to fly, and not far from being as large
as adult eagles.
“There are actually two young up here! A
male and a female, I think,” Johnsen shouts.
Down on the ground, Sletten cheers. Two
young birds means that this is a good day and
well worth the trip.
“The first five nests we visited this year were
a waste of time. Two were empty, two others
contained abandoned eggs and the eggs in one
had fallen out of the nest and were destroyed.
Not everyone willingly participates in research
projects. Some actually fight it beak and claw.
Text: Linn Sollied Madsen. Photos: Ingun A. Mæhlum
In the eagle’s eyrie
34
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