Eagles' home vanishes from tree

A nest that was in a tree since at least 1988 disappears. Wind might be to blame, but an investigation continues.

By CHRISTINA K. COSDON, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 16, 2002

LARGO -- Missing: a huge nest that for years has been home to bald eagles and their offspring.

[Times photo: Doug Clifford] Two bald eagles perch on a pine tree Monday at a property at Belleair Road and Lake Avenue in Largo.

At the base of the tall pine tree near the corner of Lake Avenue and Belleair Road that once held the nest, a few sticks, a fish head and some tire tracks are visible. Perched in branches of other trees in the area, the parent eagles and their two fledglings can be seen.

But there's no trace of the bird family's home.

That's upsetting to observers such as Bryan Sykes, who often watched the nest with his young son from their yard.

Told on Monday that the nest was missing, Sykes raced out the back door and gazed up at the pine tree across the road. "I can't believe this," he said. "It's gone."

Then he walked through his back yard, opened the fence gate and crossed Belleair Road to get a better view of the tree. He was silent for a few seconds. "This is very disturbing," he said. "I'm going to tear up."

Sykes, 40, said the eagles had been an ongoing educational experience for his 7-year-old son. They monitored the eagles' return each year, as well as the birth of the eagle chicks and the fledglings' early attempts at flight.

"My son's going to be really upset," he said.

"The nest was huge. I can't begin to tell you how big," he said as he held his arms out wide. "That was an active nest that produced many, many offspring."

According to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service records, the nest had been in the tree since at least 1988.

In the spring of 1994, the eagle chicks drew such large crowds that alarmed environmental officials put up "no parking" signs on both sides of the busy Belleair Road.

Until then, the nesting eagles, prominently visible from Belleair Road and Lake Avenue, were a local springtime attraction. People parked along the road and walked up to the property fence line to take photographs and peer through binoculars.

Clearwater resident Bill Heald said he drives on Belleair Road most weekdays but didn't notice the nest's absence until Monday.

"I could see the male and female sitting up on a branch where the nest used to be," he said. "This is too bad. I just hope the eagles don't get discouraged by whatever happened to the nest and move on."

The 168-acre property where the eagle's nest was located was owned by one of Pinellas County's pioneering families, the Taylors. The county purchased 160 of the acres for $14-million and plans to develop it into a park named Eagle Lake Park.

Debbie Chayet, a park horticulturist for the Pinellas County Park Department, said Monday that the majority of the nest disappeared around the last weekend in March. A small portion of it remained for a while, she said. She believes the nest was destroyed by wind. The property also is home to great horned owls, screech owls, and other birds and wildlife, she said.

"Hopefully, they (the eagles) will come back and build on the same site," she said.

The cause of the nest's disappearance is the subject of an ongoing investigation, said Vance Eaddy, resident agent in charge at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service law enforcement division. The investigation has been under way for two weeks, he said.

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