FreeLists / bristol-birds / [Bristol-Birds] Historical Snippet - Aug 16, 1990

["Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>]

 BBC Snippet  
Restoring a Bald Eagle population to our region became a project of passion
throughout Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia as the decade of
the 90's took flight.  No other bird conservation endeavor has been
so embraced or so rewarded by the citizens of the Mountain Empire.

The Bristol Bird Club and its members played a 
major role in making that happen.  It is one of the 
club's brightest success stories.  The project and
our members attracted national recognition and 
national awards.

It took wings and flew on Aug 16, 1990 when 
TWRA Region IV Non-game biologist Bill Yambert 
was conferring on the phone with Wallace Coffey 
about possible respiratory infection a Red-tailed Hawk might be suffering.  
It was in the care of a Bristol vet.

In conclusion of that conversation,  Yambert asked if Coffey knew anyone
that could contribute to a needed $9,000 to get the first year of a Bald Eagle
hacking project underway.  It would be conducted over several years at nearby
South Holston Lake.  They were searching everywhere for private funds.
Such monies could attract a federal cost-sharing match and raise the amount
to nearly $20,000.  Eventually, the entire cost of the project might reach some
$70,000.

Coffey response was that he would personally find the $9,000 in donations.
He felt it would not be a problem.

He went to see the publisher of the Bristol Herald Courier and proposed that
the newspaper take this on as a public project and let readers from all over
the region share in the restoration of eagles to their area.

A proposal package was sent from TWRA and the U.S. Forest Service.  It all
looked doable.  Less than two weeks later, Sam Bricado of the Cherokee 
National Forest and local ranger Sheryl Maddox were in Bristol to sign off on 
the project.  The goal was then set at $10,000. 

The hacking project would be carried out on Cherokee National Forest lands
near Little Oak Campground at South Holston.  It called for relocating 30
young eagles from nests in breeding areas from the north to South Holston.

The  Bristol Herald Courier would publish articles seeking donations and
sponsorship of eaglets to be hacked at the site.  It would be a big project.

When one eaglet was hatched near Dover, TN in 1983, it was the first 
known successful Bald Eagle nest in Tennessee in 22 years.  The number 
of nests has increased steadily since then with more than a 100 nests
each year and an estimated 120 young eagles successfully fledged
each year from those nests.

In the long run 29 birds were hacked over a 
three year period from the huge hacking
towers at South Holston.  Eaglets were
brought from Alaska and Wisconsin 
during the period 1991-1994.

In Dec 1990, the Bristol Bird Club had 
decided to make the Bald Eagle its emblem.  
The club's new newsletter was named
"The Eagle."  At the March 1991 BBC 
meeting the club donated $525 which 
was raised by gifts made that night by 
members.  The club adopted one of 30 
young eagles to be hacked.  A few weeks 
later,  Carolyn and Wallace Coffey adopted 
another bird in their own name and called it
"Big Creek" for the area near where the eagles were being hacked.

BBC named its bird "Osceola" for the birding area below South Holston Dam.
The weir was new in 1991 and the island had been the site of a Boy 
Scout camp by that name.  It seemed very appropriate.

The delivery of six birds captured from nests in Wisconsin arrived by
airplane at Tri-City Airport on Wednesday, June 10, 1992.  "Osceola" was
on board.  Wow!  What a rush.

Everything seemed to be a blur.  Money was raining in like a waterfall as 
the funding drive began.  It was kicked off at Little Oak with wildlife and
forestry officials and local civic leaders and birders attending a press 
conference.  A live Bald Eagle had been sent to the site by Dolly Parton's 
Bald Eagle project at Dollywood.  The media was feeding in a frenzy.

It was quickly decided that everyone who wanted to donate pennies or
a dollar would be allowed to participate in the contributions.  That opened
a flood gate of money.  Even people passing thru the region read about
the project in the newspaper and sent donations when they returned home.
Memorable was Mr. & Mrs. Roy Trent of Yorba Linda, CA near Santa
Ana who sent a check on behalf of their granddaughters.

A high school student by the name of Kevin Hamed, club president of the
Sullivan East High School Key Club, came to see Coffey April 5, 1991
and delivered a $500 check from the club to sponsor an eagle named 
"Patriot."  Coffey had never met Hamed.  Kevin would eventually become
naturalist at Steele Creek Park Nature Center.  With his new wife, they 
became BBC members and attended one of the club's first Christmas parties.

Tennessee Tech, where Hamed got his undergraduate 
degree, managed the hacking project and used 
graduate students to take care of the birds and release
them.   The university set up a fund and every penny 
raised was passed along to the fund.  Every check 
donated was made payable to that account.

On April 8, following the kickoff, Coffey wrote Yambert at TWRA and told
him $9,168 had been pledged and $6,665 had been received and sent
to the fund.  With the drive just two weeks underway,  he wrote that an
effort to now raise $15,000 was not a question of "as little" but of "how
much."  

When the drive was finished,  the Bald Eagle project at South
Holston Lake had received $17,700 before matching monies were
applied.  Eventually the amount raised was $23,000.   It was important 
that hundreds and hundreds of people, clubs, agencies and companies 
had participate.

Some of the least expected were the Virginia Department of Transportation
which raised $500 from their employees and named their bird "Windmaker".
Not to be out done,  BBC member Bob Quillen led his division of the Bristol
District Office of VDOT and his Right-of-Way Division raised another
$500 to name their bird "Zeus."  Quillen is now retired from VDOT.  A
public relations officer and cameraman from VDOT in Richmond came to
South Holston Lake to interviewed Quillen and another local employee.  The
story with photo appeared on the front page of VDOT's statewide employee
newspaper.  No one was concerned that this was a Tennessee project
and would be conducted in Tennessee.  The Bald Eagle is our national
symbol.

A fun aspect was a coloring contest which allowed children everywhere to
send in an entry and donate $5.00.  They colored a Bald Eagle at a nest.  
Three winners in three age groups would be selected and taken by the 
BBC members to visit the giant eagle hacking tower which was looming 
over South Holston Lake.  That would be the grand prize.  But the entries 
came in by the mailbags.  Finally, and additional 10 runner-up "Young Eagle 
Winners" were selected in each of the three age groups.  Then 119 honorable 
mentions were selected.  Every winner and their hometowns were listed in 
the newspapers.  Entries came from across the country.
The coloring contest 
was judged by birders.  
BBC members Alice Nair 
of the Smyth-Bland 
Regional Library, 
Suzanne Larkins a nursing 
student from Kingsport and 
BBC member Chris Brown 
from the Art Department 
faculty at VI College in 
Bristol judging the event.

How amazing is it that the 
Bald Eagle nest found last 
year on the Clinch River 
in Hancock County is 
just across the river from
Suzanne Larkins' family
place and she is probably the first birder to have seen that nest ?  How
amazing is it that she is a relative of Andy Jones' ?  She has been a longtime 
hawk watcher at Mendota.  Alice Nair eventually earned a masters degree at 
VA Tech studying White-eyed Vireo songs.
A rental boat company provided 
a free float boat to take the 
winning coloring contest children 
with BBC hosts to see the big 
tower in early May 1991.

Norman Bass of Lebanon, VA, 
a member of Wildlife Forever 
out of Minnetonka, MN, had the 
national organization send a 
check.   That group also 
sponsors Grizzly Bear research 
and restoration for Peregrine 
Falcons, Trumpeter Swan, 
Ruffed Grouse and pronghorn. 

The family of John I. Cox, an uncle of BBC members Lois Cox and 
Wilma Boy, adopted the next eagle after the Bristol Bird Club adopted
theirs and the Cox family named it "Cherokee."

Eagles were adopted by all kinds of interesting companies and persons,
including Pittston Coal Group, Bristol Nursing Home, Walling Distributors
DeFriece Foundation, H.S. Williams Construction Company, Johnson
City Press and Laurel Marina to name a few.

Throughout the life of the project,  other contributions came from the
Watauga Audubon Society, Bays Mountain Park Commission, Tennessee
Eastman Hiking Club, Mountain City Lumber Co., Tennessee Conservation
League and Tennessee Valley Authority.

When the TWRA wanted to create more possible nesting
sites for whatever eagles might return to the area,  they proposed cutting
a notch in the crowns of tall evergreen trees at various locations around
the lake.  Coffey approached Mike Browder of the Bristol TN electric
system and asked for help.  Browder asked Asplund Tree Service out of
Willow Grove, PA to help.  They had local climbers volunteer to show up with
their chainsaws on a Saturday and the Forest Service directed them to several
selected trees around the lake.  They climbed into the tops and cut away the 
limbs
to make a place for nests to be built.  Those location did not turnout to be 
used.

At one point Mitchell D. Tolle, a prominent artist from Kentucky, sold 
patriotic eagle prints with gold embossed lettering which commemorated 
the eagle project. He came to Bristol and signed each one for those 
who bought prints to help fund the project.

In late Nov 1990, construction was underway on the massive hacking 
tower.  A bulldozer was used to help set six large telephone poles that
the hack tower would rest upon. Ken Hale used his float boat to take 
BBC members Lori Shumate, John Shumate, Rick Knight and 
Coffey to the hack tower on Feb 3, 1991.  

On Aug 21, 1993, BBC had a field trip to the lake and took other birders 
to see the tower.  That group included Geoff Larsen, Mike Evans, Mary 
Evans, Lloyd Jones, Jay Jones, Marge Olson, Jane Fleenor, Mary 
Erwin, Judy Roach, Karen Musick, Wallace Coffey and Carolyn Coffey.

Each bird was marked with a green  wing "badge" with orange numerals.  
They wore U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service bird bands.  Each eaglet left the
hacking tower with a radio transmitter attached so its progress in getting
adjusted to the wild could be monitored.

On one late summer afternoon Larry McDaniel and Coffey were on
board an eagle hacking project float boat with a Tennessee Tech
student at South Holston, monitoring radio signals coming from
hacked eagles still at the lake which had not yet begun their late 
summer dispersal.  They were shocked to come upon a
Black Bear swimming out in the middle of the lake near the dam.  
They made the mistake of pulling the boat directly into the path of the 
bear to get photos.  Little did they know a bear will climb over
anything in its path while swimming.  Bears do not swim around.  Lucky
for this birding group,  the big creature didn't get that close.  They
followed it to shore and got nice photos.  What saved them was seeing
a boat coming in the distant and being worried it might be a wildlife
officer who would think the were harassing the bear.  They backed
away.

In the aftermath of it all, the Daughters of the America Revolution
presented Coffey with a national conservation medal for his work 
with the project.

The National Wildlife Federation recognized the Bristol Herald Courier
fund-raising effort as one of America's outstanding examples of how
"we're coming together" to save the eagle.  The federation selected
the fund raising project from among "thousands of stories around the
country that dramatically show how people working together stopped
the eagle's slide toward extinction and helped it begin its recovery."

Coffey was selected as a spokesperson for national news outlets
to contact on behalf of the NWF as the eagle was reclassified from 
endangered to threatened.

Eagles soar throughout the region.  They are on eggs at this hour 
in Kingsport, TN and on the Clinch River in Hancock County.  They are
now showing up in rural areas of Southwest Virginia where they have
never before been seen by birders.

Eagles have been observed every month of the year at South Holston 
Lake.  

That has not always been so.  Members of the BBC can testify to that.

from the archives of the Bristol Bird Club