My parents lived in a small village in Alaska in the 1990s. Much too small to have a McDonalds or even dumpsters. They had resident bald eagles in the same way many cities have pigeons. That entire region of North America has always been like this. They’ve culled hundreds of thousands of the birds over the last century because they can become a nuisance, particularly if over-populated. They’ll eat anything that looks like meat.
In the same way, the brown bear is almost non-existent in its native range in the contiguous US, but abundant further north. The bald eagle gets somewhat special treatment because it is a national symbol.
In North Dakota there are a fair number of actively used (bald) eagle nests, including in the largest city of Fargo. We have videos of them eating fish, competing over a dropped carcass, as you can imagine. There is plenty of prey in the fields, dumps, riverbanks, etc.
Yeah, there are only a few pockets of grizzlies left in the lower 48, and one of them connects to their larger territory in Canada. They used to roam throughout Washington's Cascades but are completely gone, so much so that there are efforts to reintroduce them in the NCNP soon.
Reintroduce.... grizzlies? I know the wolf reintroduction was beneficial, but wolves have killed a grand total of 2 humans in north america in the 21st century. Grizzlies, in contrast, have 11 kills in half a decade (2020- 2025). That's an order of magnitude higher of the danger each one poses, so I'm curious if the grizzly reintroduction yaysayer arguments are using wolve reintroduction as a positive example.
such a reddit comment, ugh. and I got downvoted for asking a question that you didnt like... another reddit trait. Please read the hackernews forum rules.
In the same way, the brown bear is almost non-existent in its native range in the contiguous US, but abundant further north. The bald eagle gets somewhat special treatment because it is a national symbol.