Democratic Sentinel, Volume 22, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 March 1898 — THE EAGLE’S NEST. [ARTICLE]

THE EAGLE’S NEST.

Someth'ng About the King of Birds and How It Rears Its Young. In telling of the habits, haunts and homes of the eagle in Tennessee a writer says: The eagle either builds its nest upon the top of a mighty tree growing far up on the mountain, among myriads of twining vines, and the thickest and most inaccessible bushes or shrubs, or on the summit of a high rOck. It Is always a large one, strongly and comfortably built, large sticks and branches being laid together, nearly flat and bound with twining vines. The spacious inside is covered with hair and mosses, so minutely woven together that no wind can penetrate. In this abode the mother bird lays two eggs, which are great curiosities. The long end of the egg tapers down to a point, while the color is a dirt or brownish red, with many dots and spots upon it. The young birds are driven forth from the nest by their savage parents to scratch for themselves as soon as they are able to fly, and no training whatever is given them by the old bird. That Is left to their instinct, which hunger and necessity develop. There is no going back to the old home for the young eagle, for the mother bird at once tears up every vestige of the nest where they have thriven since birth, and while they emit plaintive shrieks, darts at them and pushes them off the crags and rocks, and as they must take to their wings or fall, this is how they learn to fly at once. It takes three years for a young eagle to gain its full and complete plumage and for the development of its strength. Once full grown, provided he does not meet with a violent death, the eagle should live between 80 and 160 years.