The Opelousas courier., 1890-03-22
WHERE EAGLES ABOUND
THE BIRD OF FREEDOM PLENI4'
Full IN INDIANA.
The Golden Eagle and the Bald Ia
gle-A Rendezvous for the big
RIrdS-Their Habits.

An Indianian says in the New York
Sun."Idon'tknow that outside of Vermll'
lion County there is an Indiana man
who knows much about eagles, and may
be Vernillion County folks wouldn't be
so familiar with them if it wasn't that
Professor John Collect, the naturalist,
lives there, and he talks right out what
he knows. We have in Indiana not only
the bald but the golden eagle, and the
golden eagle doesn't hang around IN
many other places nowadays. either.
They are rare birds even in Indiana, but
there is a family of them on a farm IN
Vermillion County. Lots OF people,
even in Indiana, think they have seen
golden eagles when they haven't. What
they thought was golden eagles was the
females of the coming two-year-old male
of the bald eagle family. The reason a
bald eagle is called a bald eagle is be-
cause of a white crest with which the
male is o~rnamented. But he don't get
that crest until he is past two years old
The golden eagle looks very much ike
the bald eagle without the crest. Con
seauently, folks who amt up in eagles,
as vermillion County people arr, think
| they have had the pleasure OF seeing
specimens of the rare golden eagle, when
all they've seen was either some old bald
eagles wife or his young son.
! stThere's a farm in Vermilion County
where there is a regular bald eagle assem-
| bly, and 1t has been there as long as any
one can remember anything about that
part of the State. The eagles hold a con-
vention there every night, and Professor
| Collett says that the eagles that meet
there come from different parts of the
State for fifty or a hundred miles around.
| They come in the dusk of the evening,
! and seem to meet for some consultation
of importance, rather than to have a
social time. The big birds come soaring
in one at a time, and every newcomer IS
received with shouts of welcome by the
eagles that have preceded him to the
| rendezvous. If you've ever heard an
! eagle OF two in a cage give voice to their
national song, you can probably get
some idea of the grand and melod1ous
chorus that swells out apon the ambient
Vermilion County air about that bald
eagle ~asseqhlage of an evening. This
rendezvous is in a very solitary place,
where there are numerous high and bare
imbed sycamore trees. The eagles oc-
.upy those limbs. Professor Collett was
IN interested but unseen witness to a
gathering of these eagles Il evening,
and 1--WE Ne i11nss iea n1ssi'3 ous in fsrmi'ion
County that there has been great deal
If poetic humbug written about the
| eagle. There isn't anything noble or in
,piring about him. He is not only the
biggest of all feathered thieves, but ne is
The cruelest. His especial delight is to
attack and torture the most innocent of
birds and animals. He will capture a
iamb and teal out the eyes of the bleeding
little thing, and then release it and watch
and gloat over the agonized movements
Of its victim. When the poor lamp
grow weak and cannot exhibit it's sgony
longer the eagle will catch another Of the
flock and subject it to the same tortue.
One eagle has been known to muiilate
ten lambs in a flock in this way frighten-
ing the ewes and keeping them at a
distance by his harsh cries and loud flap
ping of his great wings. From all that
/ have seen of eagles in Indiana | don't
believe that the biggest eagle that flies
will attack any animal capable of showing
any resistance. Then it's all bosh about
the eagle disdaining to dine on anysAg
he has not vanquished and killed himself.
The bald eagle will settle down on and
make a meal off as vile carrion as will any
5uzzard that ever scented a dead horse on
the plains.
eagles grow big in Vermilion County.
( killed one once that measured a trife
Axer eleven feehfrom the tip of one wing
9e tip of the other. We don't bother
9 hi Eagles fdeshe purpose of killing
Them, 6r-@~f cou@ if one comes in our
way we lay~zs vAif we can. We
1epvhd on the Aesnd crows, and
IN their owas;A 81 buiARing, to
keep them down to a ponegond which
;heV might be destructive ndhINsses. /
don't mean hat the jaybird or the crow.
pitch in and destroy eagles by giving
them battle, but they make a business of
~,crambling every eagles egg they
cun across, and they are generally nosing
around looking for eagles eggs, too. The
eagle builds his nest out of the reach of
man on inaccessible rocky SUBMITS OF in
the top of some dry and isolated tree.
Some people believe that eagles don't
build their nests in old dead trees, be-
cause they are old dead trees, but that
when the nests were first built there the
trees were alive and were killed by the
eagles nesting in themA No one in
Vermilion County ABeAeves that,
because we know beer. - eagle Is
d bird that wants to sessB going on
all the time, and when a nest is built it
is put to a bare tree, because it offers
better opportunities for observation.
Eagles nests are built of coarse sticks,
carelessiy thrown together. They do not
furnish security TO the eggs in case of
storm, and the future of many eagle fam
lilies is destroyed by the eggs being tum-
bled out of their nests and broken on the
ground OF rocks. No one ever sees two
eagles together in flight, although close
observation in Vermilion County has es-
tablished the fact, according to Professor
Collect, that every ten miles square of
territory in that county is occupied by a
pair of eagles, assigned to their partieu-
lar locality for a hunting ground by the
general assembly of eagles that | men
toned. These two eagles come together
at night, but they never hunt in COM
panY. You may have heard of the terri.