Murphy, a bald eagle at a bird sanctuary in the United States, had been incubating a rock, and his keepers did not have the heart to separate them. He seemed ready when an eaglet needed a
Murphy, a bald eagle that had been showing fatherly instincts, has been sharing an enclosure with an eaglet that survived a fall from a tree during a storm. Photo / World Bird Sanctuary via The New York Times
There was one concern: He had never looked after more than a rock.
Bald eagles share parenting duties, so it is common for males to incubate their young. Sometimes, birds brood upon objects that are not eggs, because of a spring hormonal surge, Griffard said.
She noted that Murphy’s case, however, was somewhat unusual. He had lived at the sanctuary since the early 1990s and had never fathered an eagle, nor had he chosen to mate with either of the two females in his current enclosure. But her organisation consoled a concerned public.
“Murphy is not sad, so you don’t need to be,” the sanctuary wrote in a Facebook post.
Still, Murphy kept sitting on his rock.
In the preceding weeks, Murphy had become increasingly aggressive, leading the sanctuary to move him, and his rock, to a solo enclosure. But the keepers were moved by his tenacity, and fatherly instincts. “It was kind of like, how can we not do this?” Griffard said. “How can we not give him a chance?”
![A baby bird known only as “eaglet 23-126” has found a home, and some caring, alongside Murphy, an adult male eagle at the World Bird Sanctuary in Valley Park, Missouri. Photo / World Bird Sanctuary via The New York Times](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/resizer/v2/K26X3NK4YRDBVHOCBEIDYIWA7I.jpg?auth=02bca97992a1714e98d33046ec230325aa32fdd34c47612ea4a58c03a07e02a9&width=16&height=23&quality=70&smart=true)
The keepers moved tentatively, introducing the eaglet to Murphy’s enclosure inside of a small, heated cage that they call a “baby jail.” Through the wire, Murphy and the chick, who is known only as “eaglet 23-126,” cautiously observed each other. (Fans have implored the sanctuary to name the chick “Rocky,” but it is considered bad luck to name a bird that will be released back into the wild.)
A few days later, the bird keepers introduced the eaglet into the shared enclosure.
“We had no idea how Murphy was going to respond,” Griffard said.
But Murphy, his rock gone by then, took his role as foster parent seriously. He soon began responding to the chick’s peeps, and protecting it. And when, as a test, the keepers placed two plates of food in front of the birds — one containing food cut into pieces that the chick could eat by itself, and another with a whole fish that only Murphy could handle — the older bird tore up the fish and fed it to the eaglet, Griffard said.
“You can definitely see the imprinting happening, which is exactly what we wanted,” she added.
There are some things, such as flying (Murphy’s wing is permanently damaged) and hunting, that keepers will have to teach the eaglet later. On Saturday night, a storm swept through the area that is home to the bird sanctuary, Griffard said, and Murphy did not help to keep his charge dry.
“It was kind of scary,” she said. But, she added by email, Murphy was “doing very well learning how to be a first-time dad.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Livia Albeck-Ripka
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