On 2020-01-05 4:19 p.m., cshenk wrote:
> Dave Smith wrote:

>> We are seeing more and more of the raptors who, being way up the food
>> ladder, had consumed so much DDT that their eggs were too thin and
>> did not survive brooding.
>
> WE have bald eagles here in Virginia Beach again. I even saw one in a
> front yard on Silina last year.
>

I remember seeing the only bald eagle of my childhood when we were
camping at Point Pelee back in 1955 or thereabouts. We started seeing
them locally just a few years ago and see more and more of them every
year. Ospreys are another one that we never saw in this part of
southern Ontario, but which are now rebounding. Hawks seemed to make
out quite well, but they are hunting mostly mammals they catch in open
fields. The eagles and ospreys were afflicted because they eat fish and
the DDT was contaminating the water. Since most fish eat smaller fish
and bugs in the DDT tainted water it builds up, and the raptors, being
near the top of the food chain, were consuming it in higher doses.


It has taken decades for the raptors to recover.