First of all, bald eagles are not endangered. Not even threatened....
....However, the public does not look at eagles that way....
....So, unfortunately, we can't just blow it all off by saying: "A few eagles more or less . . . what difference does it make?"....
....As for other possible sources of lead . . . of course lead bullets aren't the only one.
But we do kill a lot of deer in Wisconsin, and others get shot and go unrecovered. And there's no shortage of evidence that eagles will scavenge dead deer. For information on lead showing up in eagles, you can google eagles x rays lead poisoning. Evidence with which you can either agree . . . or not. You can say that the evidence is "agenda driven" . . . but then we're pretty "agenda driven" ourselves here, aren't we? I made a very strong case for retaining lead shot in a two-part article I wrote on the subject for Pointing Dog Journal a few years back, and I don't feel any differently now. But I included evidence from both sides, didn't start with the assumption that everyone who opposes lead is an anti. They're not . . . and Audubon certainly is not squarely in the anti-hunting camp. I can provide personal experience on that one, should anyone wonder.
Migration . . . no, eagles are still around during gun deer season in Wisconsin.
I don't believe anyone 'blew off' anything here. First, the few dead eagles that you mentioned are lead bullet hunting related, right. Of all the body of possible sources of lead, ten year old paint chips are the example chosen to poke fun at? I wonder if the people who live in Flint, MI or the eagles that pass through that way beg to differ. If an eagle passes through the Flint area, is there a chance that they drink water from unknown sources?
Sure there's deer hunting in Wisconsin. Asked again, let's assume you're right, are there enough off season poached lead laced unrecovered carcasses to feed eagles or does all lead poisoned eagle deaths occur during the Wisconsin gun deer season?
A quick look at google and I thought the first listed search summed it up nicely. From soarraptors.org comes a general piece about the tests that they do, but then they cite the single example of a 23 year old rescue eagle. "Yep, she had probably been feeding on a lead-shot deer gut pile or deer that had been shot by a lead slug and not found by the hunter. How could this death have been prevented? If the hunter had used a non-lead slug to harvest that deer there would have been no lead shrapnel left behind to impact a non-target species."
Is that the 'probably' kind of evidence that you are basing your position on that it is lead hunting bullets that are the problem? Another quote from the Audubon folks, "....we will advocate restrictions on hunting, including the complete closure of a hunting season, whenever we are convinced that the welfare of the species involved requires it...we do not advocate hunting. This is no contradiction, though some people seem to think it is. Our objective is wildlife and environmental conservation, not the promotion of hunting. We think lots of justifications for hunting are weak ones, and too often exaggerated for commercial reasons....".
Anecdotal evidence of a hunting buddy that happens to be an Audubon member may not reflect their national platform, resource allocation and political lobbying. I have mentioned and have personal experience with a fed managed Montana duck hunting marsh that was drained for extremely vague reasons, but the dike system and access roads are fully maintained in the closed to hunting 'bird watching area'.
I also know from first hand experience that there're still eagles around in Wisconsin during the gun deer season. I also found out some time later that supposedly some of those very same eagles are already down wintering at Lake Buchanan in central Texas. There's little doubt in my mind that there are less eagles around during gun deer season, than there are drinking water in places like Flint during the summer.
Absolutely I see an agenda, and it's always a little mention at the end. We should be willing to throw lead bullet hunters under the bus in favor of lead shot hunters. Why, because those folks can withstand the anti hunting pressure because they'll be more vocal. Huh?
