Talk:Bald Eagle

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Contents 1 Bald 2 Quote 3 endangered?? 4 Contradiction 5 United States article on featured candidate nominations list 6 Not a true eagle? 7 Images? 8 Note to recent editors 9 eagles in nest 10 Hunting 11 Brink of Extinction 12 Vandalism 13 National Animal 14 This page in other languages 15 Captivity photos 16 DDT

[edit] Bald

Bald is not a zoological term, it is an English word. English (of sorts) is the language spoken in most of the bird's range, so the rm of it sorigins seems pointlessly chauvinistic. jimfbleak 07:59, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Jim - the origins of the name are quite relavant. Raul654 08:01, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

It is an English zoological term, used of other birds and mammals as well. Perhaps we should have an article on it. But there is absolutely no possibility that the bird is named from the Old English; noone (aside from philologists) has ever spoken Old English in North America.--Pharos 08:08, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

It sounds like you are requesting a reference. Is that the case? Raul654 08:10, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, surely we all agree the Bald Eagle was not named by Old English speakers? Anyway, my dictionary says "bald" is derived from the Welsh bāl, but that's a different matter. I'm not disputing that "bald" originally meant "white", but simply pointing out that the use here of course doesn't derive directly from Old English or Welsh. The word "bald", like most words, has just evolved several distinct meanings, one of which is an animal with a white top. What if we word it this way: "bald" is here a term for an animal with a white top, sharing an etymology with bald as in baldness in deriving from the Welsh/Old English for "white" Or something like that: at the the momemt I'm waxing a bit tired and verbose ;)--Pharos 08:34, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Ah, ok, so you think it's misleading to state that bald is derived for baeld when it was probably not named after that? Yes, I suppose that's a valid point - it makes a connection where not is meant to exist. Raul654 08:42, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

I take the point that you make, that it is the derivation of "Bald Eagle", and not the derivation of the word "bald" that is relevant here. jimfbleak 08:47, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm confused at this point - I think we need a source on the naming of this bird. Raul654 08:52, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Is "freaking out" OK for an encyclopedia? Mimbster 10:52, 14 February

2006 (UTC)

No,I'm so sorry, it is not the right word and Wikipedian tone, not even in a book of encyclopedia.Trampton 10:49, 15 February 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Quote

Please give me a Bald Eagle quote for a school speech. Thank you
David

Is anyone there?

How does this sound?

I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country; he is a bird of bad moral character; like those among men who live by sharking and robbing, he is generally poor, and often very lousy. The turkey is a much more respectable.

- Benjamin Franklin, 1706 - 1790

Source: [1] --Khoikhoi 00:09, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Khoikhoi. I will use this quote.

I think that Benjamin Frankln is wrong. Imagine eating the national symbol for Thanksgiving dinner.

Imagine rendering the national symbol nearly extinct with pesticides and poaching. Oops.

I think Ben Franklin was kidding. He did that a lot.

[edit] endangered??

Cut from article pending clarification:

They were on the Endangered Species list until their removal on February 13, 2006.

Please note that the US Fish and Wildlife Service has opened a public discussion period on removing the bald eagle from the endangered/threatened species list. The eagle has not yet been removed. the comment period extends until May 17, 2006.

Just so you know Ben wasn't kidding he made a hard push at the founding of our country for the turkey to be the national symbol mostly for the "intelligence" that he thought he saw...but as we know it today the turkey just have really good sense except for smell

[edit] Contradiction

This article and the wild turkey one disagree on the truth of Ben Franklin's preference for the national bird. 68.39.174.238 20:18, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

The full text of Franklin's letter is [[2]] - this wikipedia article has heavily trimmed it (and in fact reworded it - Franklin didn't say 'though vain and silly' - he said, parenthetically, "though a little vain and silly, it is true") to make it appear that Franklin did advocate the turkey for the national bird. Carefully reading, first of all, he is clearly being tongue-in-cheek to make fun of the Society of the Cincinnati (which he hated - the first part of the letter makes that plain enough); however, even if we take him at face value, he never says the turkey should be the symbol of the US - he says he's disappointed it was the eagle, and he's glad that *The Society of the Cincinnati's* emblem, which was an eagle, was poorly enough done to look like a turkey. Again, he's talking about what the Cincinnati's symbol looks like - not what the US national bird should be. Further, he notes that turkey was served at the wedding of Charles IX - is that really a selling point of a national symbol? ...And he talks about the turkey's bravery in the farm yard - making it clear he's talking about a tame turkey not a wild one. Again, would one choose a domesticated farm animal as a national symbol? The most comprehensive biography of Franklin ("The First American") falls on the side of this being just humor to tweak the Cincinnati.

Finally, this letter to his daughter in 1784 *is the only record* of Franklin mentioning, in seriousness or jest, that the turkey is a worthy symbol of anything. If he really advocated the turkey as the US national symbol, then in 1782 (when the eagle was chosen), he would have written a letter to the congress (because he was in Europe from 1776-1785), and no such letter exists.

Apologies if this is not the place to make the argument. I hope whoever resolves the dispute finds this verifiable information useful.

[edit] United States article on featured candidate nominations list

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/United States

Cast your vote! The more responses, the more chances the article will improve and maybe pass the nomination.--Ryz05 _t 02:34, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Not a true eagle?

The French version of this page claims the bird is not a true eagle. Is that correct? I've never heard that before, and I don't see that in this article. Funnyhat 07:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

It actually depends on what one terms as a true eagle. By the sounds of it the French article is a little biased towards the fact that the bird is not a member of the Aquila genus. (Aquila is the latin term for "eagle." ) However, the habits and physical appearance of the bald eagle indeed mark it as an eagle: it has the hook shaped beak, the large grasping feet, and wingspan of an eagle Futhermore, its closest relative in Europe is the white tailed eagle (you can tell the difference between the two by looking at the feet: bald eagles have yellow feet, but the European one has orange feet.)

A similar situation occurs with the thrushes and some other groups. Genus Turdus is often described as the "true" thrushes, to differentiate it from the American Catharus and Asian Zoothera. jimfbleak 12:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Here's an interesting article from American Scientist about that very topic --- http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/53060?&print=yes Should the article be changed? Rumpelstiltzkin 14:33, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Why - there is no doubt that the baldie is an eagle, it's just not in the genus Aquila. The use of phrases like true eagle or true thrush is probably best avoided, at least at genus level - true usually translates as the ones that occur in western Europe. jimfbleak 15:31, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Genus aside, the baldie is a known scanvenger. I don't know if other eagles are partial scavengers. But it's (the baldie) is the only one, then does in belong in the eagle family?Rumpelstiltzkin 16:03, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Diet is of little significance - a very quick check in my European field guide showed that Golden and Spotted Eagles (both Aquila) as well as White-tailed (Haliaeetus) will also take carrion - large birds of prey in northern latitudes can't afford to let a good corpse go to waste. Eagle is a poorly defined term, and refers more to size and appearance than anything else - the eagles are not necessarily closely related to each other. jimfbleak 05:47, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! You've been very helpful. Much appreciated. Rumpelstiltzkin 19:58, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Images?

Why are the images on the gallery no appearing?

[edit] Note to recent editors

1. The religious symbol section is wikified. Words such as "eagle" only need to be linked the first time they appear in an article, not every time.
2. The agreed convention is that the names of bird species are capitalised, so Bald Eagle, Golden Eagle
3. The section stating frequent comparison with the bible and crucifix is improbable and unsourced, so I've removed it pending a verifiable source.
4. "Certifiable" tribe - sounds improbable, since it suggests legal ethnic separation still exists in the US, but I don't know if it's true or not, so I left it in. Shouldn't it be certified anyway?
5. External links should be to sites giving more information on the bird, not linkspam to campaigning groups like "Religious Freedom with Raptors".

Thanks, jimfbleak 05:41, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

RE: CRUCIFIX/BIBLE COMPARISON: comparison between eagle feather and the bible and cruifix are common in native american community, i've used it myself and so have many others i've known. am including a couple references in this regard, although will try to locate more.

RE: LEGAL/ETHNIC SEPARATION: legal ethnic separation still exists in the united states, which is what the link to that website showed. i saw the site, it links to lots of articles that verify this and have therefore put it back. i believe that articles that directly relate to the bird and its status as a religious object in this country does provide additional information about the bird itself. read the articles i'm including in the references and you'll have a better idea.

RE: CERTIFIABLE TRIBE: i'm not sure i understand what you're getting at by asking "shouldn't it be certified anyway?", although I will say that one's race or skin color should not determine one's religious freedom. similarly, i find it detestable to require someone to prove their ethnicity in order to be treated with compassion and respect.

Link to group Religious Freedom with Raptors (www.geocities.com/eaglefeatherlaw) provided as additional information resource to readers regarding current status (legal, religious, and cultural) of the bald eagle as a religious object. Link was neither positive or negative, simply provided, in Wikipedia standards, for reader to have additional information and to make up their own minds.

[edit] eagles in nest

I found a wonderful picture of two eagles in their nest, it was taken by NASA so it public domain. HighInBC 14:11, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hunting

Removed part of the "Range, habitat, and restoration" section. It says that there are no hunting restrictions (and that there is somehow an overpopulation in the US), yet the species has yet to be taken off the endangered species list and it remains illegal to own any portion of the bird (except under the special circumstances mentioned later in the article). Furthermore, if "State Park officials" really wanted eagle hunters to "trim the population," one would think specific states would be mentioned. The section smells fishy (heh, puns...) to me, I'm removing it until someone can cite a source. --65.24.137.39 06:25, 6 October 2006 (UTC)Dan.

I'm gonna remove that section, as it is obviously false. It doesnt even fit with the rest of the paragraph. It gave me a good laugh though. Acbrog 21:09, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Brink of Extinction

I fixed the wording in the first paragraph to change it from "is on the brink of extinction" to "was", and fixed some of the wording. If how it stands now is not correct as regards relative danger of extinction, someone please fix further. Thanks. Jimaginator 19:40, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

And why was the image removed and marked as a minor edit? I replaced it and removed the nonsense about Bison.

Bald eagles are, and have been, a dime a dozen in Canada for some time and NO WHERE near extinction

[edit] Vandalism

The following information is, I can only assume, vandalism. It's located on the right info bar. I don't know what the correct classifications are, but I doubt it has anything to do with the diets of sharks. If someone could please edit the following, I'm sure it would be appreciasted all around.

Kingdom: Shark Bait

Phylum: Shark Meat

Class: Shark Food

Order: Shark Chum

Family: Shark Meat

Species: H. leucocephalus

I'd do it myself, but am such a noob, I don't know how. Nuts.

--Joe In Seattle —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.227.219.0 (talk) 06:57, 28 January 2007 (UTC).

More Vandalism "The species was on the brink of extinction in the US late in the 20th century, but the species population has increased by 10,000 in the last year thanks to the works of Stephen Colbert, and has been finally removed from the U.S. federal government's list of endangered species. This is the second instance of Stephen Colbert saving a species from the brink of extension.[1]"

What did this sentence originally state?

I nominated this page twice for semi-protection at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection and it was denied, because the level of vandalism was not high enough. I think the admins have set too high of a standard for this, because obviously it is now difficult to separate fact from fiction after all the nonsense. Dhaluza 10:31, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

It's always easy to revert vandalism back exactly to the previous edit using rollback (or page history). I would be inclined to agree that this page isn't vandalised quite enough for protection (and it's on my watchlist). I've been through and the content appears OK, with one probably true but unreferenced fact being tagged as such. jimfbleak 11:12, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] National Animal

The problem with national animals is that they are hardly recognized nor they have any relevance at all, if so they range at the level with national trees, landscapes and national weed breedings. Nuff for the subtext, I just want to mention that the Bald Eagle is not the "national animal" for the USA only, Germany has it as its national animal too, so my doubts refer to the special paragraph about the Bald Eagle as the national animal from USA. 62.226.47.119 23:00, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This page in other languages

Please add reference to ru:Белоголовый_орлан

[edit] Captivity photos

Now that we have lots of new images added to the pool, can we agree to drop all the photos of the birds in captivity? There are still two that have barn-board siding in the backgrounds. We should try to show only wild birds in their natural habitat now. Dhaluza 22:30, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Besides the two you mentioned from the National Aviary, there are a number of images that are also from captivity currently in use. Plus many of them do not say whether they are from the wild or not. Is the standard whether or not they look like they are in captivity or not? this image is from captivity, but it's also a featured picture. I counted 5 images from captivity being used (at least). All of them are of high quality and I think we should keep all of them, unless of course there is an otherwise exactly equivalent picture from the wild. -- RM 23:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Photos with obvious evidence of captivity are less valuable. In many of the photos dropped from the gallery, the birds appeared to be in poor condition. On one of the new gallery images, the perched bird is on a man-made perch, and is wearing bewits, so it's more appropriate for an article on falconry. We should drop these in favor of images that at least appear to show the birds in their natural setting. I don't think they need to be equivalent, since the image choice is arbitrary. One head-shot is enough, so let's keep one with blue sky, rather than a man-made background, for example. Dhaluza 01:08, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you for most part, except that I think that images should only be replaced with wild ones if the only major difference is the background. And since the head-shot with a blurred man made background is a featured picture and the one with the blue background is not, i'm going to disagree with you again. The better picture here should prevail. I have no problem keeping both, however. Image choice is not exactly arbitrary, because the goal should be educational value. Most or all of the quality images are already in the article. Are there any others that you've found that would be better? -- RM 01:22, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DDT

The pro-DDT stuff in here seems biased an unnecessary.

I agree. Not only is it completely out of place in the article, it is an awful lot of material which is not balanced at all by anything. It's not just that it's unbalanced, it just sort of jumps at you and screams "why is this here?" Additionally, I'm not sure it agrees very well with scientific consensus. It seems like an malicious insertion by an anti-environmental lobby and begs the question as to why we're talking about what didn't hurt eagles instead of what did. 66.57.99.110 19:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me the most important question to ask about the DDT comments is - are they accurate? They appear to be more accurate than generic statements like "DDT didn't contribute to declining Eagle populations."