Young golden eagles tagged

This was part of a cross-border golden eagle project coordinated by the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Radolfzell, Germany, and carried out jointly with the Konrad Lorenz Research Center at the University of Vienna and the Swiss Ornithological Institute in Sempach.

The international research project aims to gain more knowledge about the spatial behavior, movement patterns and survival chances of top predators by tagging young eagles throughout the Alps. Young eagles usually begin to leave their parents' territory in November. This is followed by various phases in which they fly as "floaters" over practically the entire Alpine region, before settling down at around 4-5 years of age to form a territorial pair. Their survival rates depend heavily on competitive effects for resources.
The research project aims to find out which causes of mortality and mortality risks can be identified. Of great interest are also the various factors influencing the survival and reproduction of golden eagles, such as food resources, habitat factors, human influences and
intraspecific conflicts in the use of space.

"We fitted the golden eagles Babsi and Ferdi with customized transmitters. These are fitted exactly to the bird and fit like a sports climbing harness without restricting the birds' freedom of movement. The young eagles can only be tagged in a very short period of time, as the animals must not be tagged too early, but also must not be startled from the eyrie and made to perform a risky flight maneuver. The operation was carried out by a team of biologists, veterinarians and experienced alpinists," says National Park employee DI Christian Fuxjäger, describing the transmitter operation.