The Bald Eagle Nest Cam That Hatched a Global Community

[yortsed snacilbuper]

A pair of the raptors nesting in Pennsylvania have transformed hundreds of strangers into a tightknit group.

Patricia Buntz, 71, walks with a cane and has suffered medical problems in recent years that have left her homebound in Scranton, Pennsylvania. But thanks to a webcam outside of Pittsburgh, for several hours each night she's transported 300 miles away, high into a tree with a pair of Bald Eagles.

“My family thought I was nuts,” says Buntz, of the period in early 2014 when she fist started watching the livestream and conversing with people in the accompanying chat room, where she goes by Paddy. It got to the point where Buntz was signing on every day, chatting with other eagle-cam enthusiasts from across the United States and abroad like they were close family, and getting her grandkids to crowd around when one of the eggs was hatching. 

Buntz says she didn’t know anything about Bald Eagles before her sister told her about the cam, but she quickly picked up tidbits from her fellow fans, from clutch size (usually one to three eggs), to wingspans (as much as eight feet), to ways to tell males apart from females (ladies are larger, for one). 

Buntz is hardly the only one who has become obsessed with the flash of feathers on a computer screen. Since the Hays Bald Eagle Cam (named for the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Hays) went online in December of 2013, it has garnered more than 5 million views, with regular chatters hailing from as far away as Texas, California, Ireland, Holland, and Greece.

http://www.audubon.org/news/the-bald-eagle-nest-cam-hatched-global-community

[a kennedy]

1. this as well in Decorah, IA......thousands of fans talk about the

eagles.

http://www.ustream.tv/decoraheagles

[nolabear]

2. A pair in Florida has a devoted following right now. One chick hatched today

And if all goes well the other will hatch tomorrow, in the new year. Cool, eh?