Question

What would happened if the eagle population increased

Answer 1

The once dwindling bald eagle population that brought the raptor close to extinction in the United States has soared in the past decade, according to a new report by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Eagle populations quadrupled in size since 2009 with 316,700 individual bald eagles spotted and 71,400 nesting pairs recorded during the 2019 breeding season, reports Lauren M. Johnson and Liz Stark for CNN.

Answer 2

Bald eagles' population size is being affected by lead poisoning, according to scientists at the Department of Public and Ecosystem Health at Cornell University. A study looking at records between 1990 and 2018 found the birds are eating hunters' gunshot ammunition, decreasing their population growth by 4% to 6%.

For the study, published in the Journal of Wildlife Management, scientists looked at population regrowth numbers for bald eagle populations across the Northeast. They found that hunters who "field dress" their prey and leave the contaminated organs on site put the eagles that scavenge the remains at risk. Other species, including owls, crows, coyotes, foxes, fisher and bears, eat the remains as well, meaning they are all possibly at risk of being poisoned.