Nature Notes - Wedge-tailed Eagle

Features

Wedge-tailed Eagles (Aquila audax) are Australia's largest bird of prey. They have heavily feathered legs, a long diamond shaped tail with a wedge tip and fingered wing tips.

Adaptations

The Wedge-tailed Eagle have sophisticated binocular vision which enables them to accurately assess distances and pinpoint their prey. Their eyes also are equipped with bony rings which can squeeze and elongate the eyeball. This has the same effect as a telephoto lens on a camera. It enlarges the image seen by the bird.

They have a poor sense of smell and taste.

Wedge-tailed Eagles use the updrafts of thermals or hillslopes to rise effortlessly rarely needing to flap their huge wings. They soar very high in great cirlcles. Pairs often engage in aerobatic displays to advertise their territory to competitors.

Habitat

Wedge-tailed Eagles tend to nest on the sides of the Ranges in tall gum trees and hunt in the open desert woodlands.

Range

All of Australia and Southern New Guinea.

Wild Status

Wedge-tailed Eagles are common in open country. Until as recently as the 1960s Australia’s largest eagle was condemned and ruthlessly persecuted as a threat to lambs and sheep. Seeing the birds picking at carcasses led  graziers to assume they were responsible for killing the stock. Research established that Wedge-tailed Eagles hardly ever attack fit lambs, let alone full-grown sheep.

Diet

Wedge-tailed Eagles are powerful hunters. They use their strong, sharp claws and pointed beak to tear their prey apart. They like fresh meat (rabbits, young kangaroos (joeys) and large lizards) but are also scavengers of carrion and are often seen along highways feeding on road kill.

Predators

Eagle chicks are preyed on by Black-breasted Buzzards, Dingoes and feral cats. Cars kill many eagles scavenging on roadkill.

Home

Eagle make large nests called eyries. They're built from sticks and placed high in the forks of trees and can be as big as 2 metres diameter and 4 metres deep.

Life Span

Wedge-tailed Eagles can live up to 20 years.

Size

Wingspan 1.8-2.5m - Females 4.2kg Male 3.2kg .

Reproduction

Wedge-tailed Eagles mate for life and use the same nest year after year, adding to it as they go. They breed June to November in good times. Females can lay up to 3 eggs but only the strongest survive, they take 45 days to hatch. Males and females share the incubating of the eggs and the feeding of the chicks. Young leave the nest at 80-90 days old. In desert regions birds may not breed at all for a number of years if there is no rain.

Extra Fun Facts

Wedge-tailed Eagles can fly up to 2km high and soar for up to 90 mins.

Hatchlings are covered in pure white down.

Compare with the hawks and eagles of the Sonoran Desert.