Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 126, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1903 — it Is a Bald Eagle. [ARTICLE]

it Is a Bald Eagle.

The big eagle received from Michigan Wednesday by Charley Spriggs for the school museum, has been identified as a bald eagle, in the immature state of its plumage. These eagles when a year old are nearly black, and are then called black or Washington At two years they are generally grayish in plumage, though they vary greatly, and are then called gray or sea eagles. In their third year they get the white heads and other general markings of the bald eagles. It is a peculiarity of these birds that their wing quills are longer at two years old than when fully mature, so that their spread of wings when at that age is greater than when older. Thus it is very rare that one of them with a white head is found to measure as mnoh as this two year old does, namely 7 feet and 4 inches. Practically all bird anthoritiea now agree that there are bnly two species of eagles ever seen in the United States, the bald eagle and the golden eagle.