I spent all of last saturday (1/6) watching bald eagles on the Skagit
River with a North Cascades Institute field seminar led by local
eagle guru Libby Mills - we concentrated our search between Rockport
and Marblemount on Highway 20 and had great success throughout the
day. (We were lucky enough to not only stay dry, but also get some
rare sunshine.) Dozens of eagles were easily viewable from the
highway at the Rockport turn off, and our class found a prime viewing
spot on the opposite side of the river where we stopped counting
white heads after 100! One solitary big-leaf maple tree on the
river's edge held between 30-40 eagles. Both adults and immatures
were actively feeding on chum salmon carcasses that were washed-up on
gravel bars. Our group also saw large steelhead jumping out of the
water near the Marblemount hatchery (and the attendant fishermen, on
shore and in drift boats), though the eagles weren't hunting them,
probably because the chum carcasses were so plentiful. Libby reported
seeing over 400 bald eagles (!!!) from one vantage point on the
Skagit earlier in the week; she thinks she must've got lucky by
showing up in the middle of a migration coming down from BC.

North Cascades Institute, where I work, has Eagle Watcher volunteers
stationed up and down Highway 20 every weekend in to early February.
They are out there rain or shine with spotting scopes, field guides,
info on good viewing sites and lots of enthusiasm and good cheer. If
you want to learn when and where the Eagle Watchers are located,
please visit http://www.ncascades.org/programs/stewardship/
eagle_watchers/. There you can also find out info about the Bald
Eagle Interpretive Center in Rockport, the Bald Eagle Festival in
Concrete and more.

My favorite part of the outing came at the end of the day, when our
group watched the eagles fly away from the riverbanks and disappear
into the snowy mists on Sauk Mountain as they headed to their night
roosts.

Christian Martin
Communications Coordinator
North Cascades Institute
360-856-5700, ext. 204
http://www.ncascades.org


Are many eagles already feeding near Concrete & Marblemount WA? I am
interested in driving up this weekend if so.
-Rebecca Laszlo
Seattle WA





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