Beachgoers' relief as eagle is landed
Date: 24-Aug-01
Country: USA
The eagle, now at Tufts University's wildlife facility in Grafton, Massachusetts, for evaluation, was caught just before noon (5 p.m. British time) this week at Salisbury beach, Massachusetts, just south of New Hampshire.
A local animal control officer, Jim Lindley, "lured it by tossing up a tennis ball and some food - roast beef and ham," explained New Hampshire Fish and Game Department spokesman Eric Aldrich. "He got close enough so he could grab its feet and neck."
Officials were already on Salisbury Beach and had cleared the area because they had received a report that the eagle had strafed a small child. Earlier this week, the eagle had scratched an eight-year-old at neighbouring Hampton Beach in New Hampshire.
Wildlife officials described the chocolate brown bird as about 3 1/2 feet (one metre) tall, with a 6-foot (two metre) wingspan and estimated it was about 18-months-old.
"It obviously had picked up some bad habits since it was released" on July 25 from a North Carolina wildlife facility, Aldrich said. Earlier officials said the bird had been released from a Massachusetts facility.
The eagle, a member of an endangered species, took up residence in the rooftops and chimneys of Hampton Beach over the weekend and started going after footballs being tossed in the air. Several earlier attempts to capture it failed.
The eagle had been injured in Kernersville, North Carolina, on May 17. It was nursed back to health at the Carolina Raptor Center near Charlotte, North Carolina, before it was released.
