Sooner Lake, Oklahoma - Bald Eagle Cam

http://www.suttoncenter.org/eaglecam.html
Thanks, char, for bringing this camera and its extremely rare clutch of four eggs to our attention! This cam has streaming video; the camera is mounted on a telephone pole about 100 yards from the nest. There is also a nest-mounted cam, but unfortunately it seems to have failed completely, after working intermittently for a while. Fortunately it stayed up long enough so the staff at the Sutton Center could confirm that there were four eggs.

The nest is on Sooner Lake, near Stillwater in north-central Oklahoma. The current nest is on an artificial tower erected by the Sutton Avian Research Center and local utility OG&E to replace the original dead nest tree used by this pair after it fell down. The pair first built a nest in the dead tree in 1995, and laid their first eggs in 1996. Since then, they've fledged 22 eaglets, with three eaglets in 2000 and 2002. This is the first year they've known how many eggs were laid; they do know that three eggs hatched in 2007, but the youngest chick was unable to compete for food with its older siblings, so only two of them fledged.

2007-2008 Season:

• eggs laid: The first egg was laid around February 1. These eagles usually lay their eggs about a day apart, so it's possible the fourth one was laid by February 7. This is closer together than most of the other nests I've been observing over the last couple of years - and because the nest cam was not available on a regular basis, it is a guess.
• hatched: first maybe March 11 (39 days for #1); maybe second on March 12; some observers thought they saw a third - and then the cam went down ; two eaglets in the nest on April 16 when the cam was fixed
• fledged: May 26 morning (76 days); June 2 7:40 am (82 days)
• last seen: both seen June 17 (~ 98 days or 14 weeks); one seen June 24 (105 days/15 weeks); cam down shortly thereafter

(Thanks to Alan Jenkins, Assistant Director of the G. M. Sutton Avian Research Center, for the background information and the picture of the eggs)

They need to change the cam...looks like there is one on that wooden frame above the nest...

Well, I just got a nice reply to my questions from Alan Jenkins at the G. M. Sutton Avian Research Center, and I'll be adding a lot more information to the opening post either this afternoon or tomorrow. Unfortunately their closeup cam has only been working intermittently, and now seems to have failed completely. I expect he'll keep trying it, and if it magically comes back on, their plan was to stream both with a split screen format. But that seems unlikely. The wide angle cam is 100 yards from the nest and can be zoomed and possibly moved a bit (I think remotely) - but the angle is wrong for looking into the nest bowl.

And he's referring to it as the Sooner Lake nest, so I'm changing the thread name to that - hopefully it's still early enough that folks won't be confused by the change.

thanks for the info! too bad about the c/u cam.

I didn't want to take up more room in an already-long opening post - but Alan Jenkins provided the year by year fledges from the nest, which is interesting data to have. Most of the past numbers are based on observations from the ground near fledging time.

The history of the Sooner Lake nest is:
1995 - built, no eggs laid
1996 - 2 young fledged
1997 - 2
1998 - 1
1999 - 2
2000 - 3
2001 - 2
2002 - 3
2004 - 1
2005 - 2
2006 - 2
2007 - 2

If you have a chance to check out their web site - http://www.suttoncenter.org/mbere.html - it has a lot of interesting information!

Edited to correct typo in date. ~JudyB

Thanks for all this, JudyB, another nest! LOL.....
Four eggs should be interesting.......

looks like dad is watching over mom!

Looks really windy there today!

Thanks for the info. I was wondering how they got the pics of the eggs and I can hardly see the parent. It's an interesting history about the dead tree where their nest was that fell and them taking to the new structure.

I think you mean 1998 not 1989

It was amazing - there was this space ship, and it took them to the bermuda triangle, and ....

Hmmm - maybe you're right.

I was watching for a while today - lots of incubating and some egg turning, but no sign of feeding yet - though the first one could hatch any day now!

Just watching, mom eagle flew off. Dad was waiting to babysit. Through the front boards, I think I saw a little head bobbing, but Dad didn't feed anyone, just sat on top of the clutch. The commentary suggests that a hatching should have occurred by now. This is the four egg clutch!
M. Mary

I just had a peek and the cam was zoomed WAY back from the nest--so much that it is impossible to tell what's going on in the nest

Cam just zoomed back in. They definitely were feeding at least one chick yesterday, and someone on the Maine forum thought they caught a glimpse of two. Haven't seen any pics yet - but it's really hard to catch a tiny flash of gray fuzz!

I know I've seen two and maybe three little heads, if you double click the picture a panel comes up on the left (you have to put your cursor over it - it pops up inside the screen) that will allow you to zoom in and move around a bit. If you zoom in too close, it's hard to tell but when I zoomed in once, I know for sure I saw two little wobbly heads.

Thanks for the tip on the zoom function, Char

It's a little windy at the moment which blurs the cam somewhat All that I've seen when I check occasionally is an eagle sitting in the nest bowl.

It's going to be amazing if all four of the eggs hatch I just hope that the parents can bring enough food to feed them. The Norfolk eagles raised triplets last year and it was amazing to watch how they both fed the eaglets together

Mom has been spending a lot of time seemingly moving all those eggs about! Now settling down.

awwww...Dad has brought a stick for Mom!

Ma and Pa both doing a lot of beaking down in the nest bowl.
Ma took off, now Dad doing some brooding....4:12 PT

It appeared that the parents were just feeding one, and perhaps two bobble heads. It appears that there are two little heads between the parents

This is a 4-minute video of when the parents were feeding the bobbleheads. There definitely are at least a couple I think.

I used the zoom feature to get in a little closer

They seem to be "team-feeding" like the the Norfolk parents did

Video Link - Feeding the Bobbleheads

That would be wonderful! I put the cam on zoom, but was tough to look for fur balls in there. Ma and Pa were doing an awful lot of rummaging around in there.

Just watched your vid, Skipper and yes, I do think I did see something moving around down below the adults! Did you see Dad pull something out of Mom's beak? LOL.....thanks very much for that!

Hi all..I have tried every which way to view the Sooner Lake Eagles..when I get to the website there is no link for eagle cam..can anyone help! Is there a cam to watch there...if n1 has a link to view cam..id so appreciate it..

Thanks..lynn

Lynn, I had to follow the instructions here..
http://www.suttoncenter.org/eaglecam.html

And download Java or Active X to access this cam. I did get it and it so far hasn't interrferred with my 'puter, so hope it's okay! Only way I could view the nest!
Give it a try.

Go down to this part and follow instructions..
To view the video, we recommend that you have the latest version of your browser (Internet Explorer 7, or Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.12), and Java.
If prompted for permission to install an applet by publisher "Andy", click "Yes."

Bunny ty..but I did that like 4 times and I still cant see any eagles....I see a white box with black around it..but no image..is it because its night or am I still not connecting..

Ive tried it on IE 7 and firefox...ugh Im so tired and still sick but really wanted to see this for myself...

Where is the actual cam link on that page Bunny..is it that white box with black around the edge and it says Cambozi or something inside the white part...

Okay ty hun...

Hugzz..Lynn

Hi, Lynn, yeah, it is night time there now, so probaly the cam shut down. Yes, there is just a white box there with Cambozola or something on it. Wait till tomorrow and try again.
PM me if you still have trouble. I will be in and out tomorrow ( chore day!)