COVID caused boom in eagle population

Imperiled Bonelli’s eagles experienced a baby boom, increasing in numbers thanks to the anthropause lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Bonelli’s eagles (Aquila fasciata) have been declining in Spain in recent years due to human-driven factors such as electrocution, poaching, and poisoning. At least one Spanish province has listed them as endangered as a result. But new research published in Biological Conservation tracking long-term productivity showed that in 2020, the year that the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world, the species had the highest average number of chicks born per pair in 31 years of monitoring. “The lockdown coincided with critical stages of reproduction: the end of the incubation period and the entire time the chicks were growing in the nest,” said José María Gil and Marcos Moleón, the researchers who led the study, in a press release. “The absence of disturbance by humans in the vicinity of the nesting sites resulted in exceptional reproduction for our times, but reflects what must have been normal before human pressure reached current levels.”

Read more at the University of Granada.