Eaglets in the Nest

I happened to check the eagle cam and noticed something fuzzy beneath the eagle. It looks like the eggs have hatched but I haven’t received an update from the MN DNR since the 1st of March and they hadn’t started hatching at that time.  There were three eggs in the nest so hopefully there are three healthy eaglets beneath the eagle parent. One time the eagle got up but I couldn’t tell if there were two or three so my fingers are crossed. Here’s a little information about eagles from the MN DNR.

Asynchrony
We all watched in late January this year as the adult female eagle laid three eggs over about six days. We will see the chicks hatch in the same order as their eggs were laid. This is called asynchronous hatching. Bald Eagle chicks grow a lot in their first week or so of life and in these early stages the size difference between the first hatched chick and the last will be large. The first chick will compete more for food and parental attention, using its larger size to get routinely fed first. This can be a little tough for Eagle Cam viewers to watch. For the first weeks the youngest eaglet will look weak and tiny compared to its siblings. Have no fear, this natural need to compete for life from the very beginning in the nest helps ensure that strong eaglets make it to fledge and that our future adult population is made of strong eagles. In previous years we have even seen the eldest chick expire while the youngest goes on to fledge!
 
Busy time for adults
Once their chicks hatch the adult eagles have a huge responsibility to feed and care for their new chicks. We will start to see food brought into the nest very frequently, it will pile up around the nest. This pair tends to bring a lot of fish, ducks and pigeons to feed their young. Because of this added burden of caring for very rapidly growing chicks, we will see the adult eagles switch off at the nest more often and will start to get to observe feeding sessions.