2019

A New White-tailed Eagle Nest has been Found near Lake Burtnieks

LVM expert's search for a white-tailed eagle nest in the vicinity of Lake Burtnieks has been successful. White-tailed eagles have been seen around Lake Burtnieks and in its surroundings for at least five years. The different observation times and the fact that adult birds were seen showed that there should be a nest somewhere nearby.

However, the concept of “proximity” in the sense of eagles is a stretched concept, and the LVM forest site where the nest is found occupies nearly 2 000 hectares. Kaspars Liepiņš, LVM Environmental Planning Specialist, managed to find the nest, when performing forest management works in this area.

Although the white-tailed eagle is a large bird and its nest is large, the search for the nest in the Burtnieks forest array is difficult. “In summer, visibility is hampered by leaves of trees and shrubs, and in winter - by snow; many places are flooded in spring and autumn. This time, too, to find the nest, we had to “enjoy” the cold spring waters to cross the overflown river depression, take off our rubber boots and just wade,” tells the finder of the nest.  

Mārtiņš Kalniņš, LVM Environmental Planning Specialist, points out: “In this and other cases, when we find protected bird nests, we make an area for habitat protection and a buffer zone – an area where we do not perform any economic activities in the nesting season. This nest will also be included in the annual list of nests to be surveyed. Preserving biodiversity and reducing the environmental impact of forest management activities are an integral part of forest management planning and day-to-day forest management works, because it is important for us to understand whether our forest management practices in general, as well as the specific measures to protect a particular nest are effective”.

In the photo: white-tailed eagle babies from the nest of Lake Burtnieks in June 1955 (Ģirts Kasparsons, from the archive of Ruslans Matrožs)

In the 19^th century and at the beginning of the 20^th century, there were 8 to 10 couples of white-tailed eagles nesting in Latvia; one of them nested at Lake Burtnieks. Later, their number decreased and in the 1950s there was only one nesting place near Lake Burtnieks, where two baby birds were found in 1955. In the following years, nesting was no longer observed here and until the seventies, there were no other known white-tailed eagle nesting sites in Latvia.

At the end of the nineties, ornithologist Juris Lipsbergs built an artificial nest for white-tailed eagles, next to the site of the current nest. There is no information as to whether any white-tailed eagles inhabited the artificial nest, but the newly discovered nest is a natural nest built by white-tailed eagles themselves.