Bald eagle count soars at Lake Tahoe mtdemocrat.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from mtdemocrat.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Laney Griffo | Special to The Union
On the second Friday of the year, from 9 a.m. to noon, volunteers spread out to 26 locations around Lake Tahoe to look for birds.
Laney Griffo
The crisp air chills the group of bird watchers as they sit on the pier at Zephyr Cove, on Lake Tahoe’s South Shore, waiting for bald eagles to show themselves.
One of the bird watchers comes from Sacramento every year to sit on the same pier to count bald eagles with the Tahoe Institute of Natural Science.
Since the 1980s, groups have gone out once a year to count the number of bald eagles they see within a three-hour time period.
Photo during annual Bald Eagle county by Jeff Bleam
NCLINE VILLAGE, Nev. A record number of Bald Eagles were counted at Lake Tahoe during the recent annual survey conducted by the Tahoe Institute of Natural Science (TINS) and its team of 200 volunteers.
This year 42 Bald Eagles were found, surpassing the previous record of 27 set in 2017.
The record number of volunteers are double the number who turned out for last year s event, part of why TINS believes this was the most accurate count to date. TINS took over local coordination of the national tracking effort nine years ago.
“Based on reports of sightings from recent weeks we expected to see quite a few eagles during the count, but this total was surprising.” said TINS outreach director, Sarah Hockensmith. “As always our tally is based on careful examination of the timing of movements of individual birds from one station to the next, and we believe we have a conservative and accurate tally for the day.”
lgriffo@tahoedailytribune.com
On the second Friday of the year from 9 a.m. to noon, volunteers spread out to 26 locations around Lake Tahoe to look for birds.
Laney Griffo
The crisp air chills the group of bird watchers as they sit on the pier at Zephyr Cove, on Lake Tahoe’s South Shore, waiting for bald eagles to show themselves.
One of the bird watchers comes from Sacramento every year to sit on the same pier to count bald eagles with the Tahoe Institute of Natural Science.
Since the 1980’s, groups have gone out once a year to count the number of bald eagles they see within a three-hour time period.