Bald eagle officially national bird of the United States after 250 years

This article was last updated on December 26, 2024

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Bald eagle officially national bird of the United States after 250 years

The Bald Eagle is now officially the national bird of the United States. President Biden signed a law to this effect this Christmas.

The bird had been the symbol for The land of the free and the home of the brave for 250 years, but that had not been officially recorded in all that time.

After the Revolutionary War of 1776, the American eagle (or eagle) appeared on the copper and silver coins of the United States. The new Congress then took six years to agree on the eagle as a coat of arms emblem. Founding Father Benjamin Franklin thought nothing of it: “It is a bird of bad character.” Franklin preferred a bird more respectable to him: the wild turkey.

It was the bald eagle that appeared on the presidential seal, with an olive branch in one claw and arrows in the other. Eagles have symbolized strength, freedom and courage for centuries and can be found as a coat of arms in many countries.

Jack Davis, vice chairman of the National Eagle Center, said: “For nearly 250 years, we called the bald eagle a national bird when it wasn’t. But now the title is official. The bird deserves nothing less.”

The national symbol was threatened with extinction in the last century because farmers, fishermen and hunters regularly shot the bird. They then used pesticides that made the eagle’s eggs infertile. The National Emblem Act then came into effect in 1940. The white-tailed eagle became a protected species and it was forbidden to sell or shoot the animal.

While there were 400 bald eagle couples in the 1960s (the animals, like the swan, remain together for the rest of their lives), today there are 71,000 couples and more than 300,000 individual bald eagles in North America.

Other laws

President Biden signed dozens of laws just before the end of the year and his term as president. For example, there is now a federal Anti-Hazing Law. This makes it mandatory for student associations in the US to report abuses, such as violence or abuse, in the event of hazing.