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Wounded and wary, the young couple appear to be into each other: their arranged romance, years in the making, is aimed at preserving the rapidly disappearing harpy eagle, one of the world’s largest raptors.<\/p>\n
In an immense dome in Colombia, biologists\u00a0have recreated a tropical rainforest where they have slowly introduced the monogamous birds, hoping they will hit it off, mate and produce an eaglet.<\/p>\n
That is, if the female does not\u00a0get territorial and kill her suitor.<\/p>\n
“A bad decision on our part could lead to an attack,” said Luisa Escobar, research coordinator at Biopark La Reserva, a foundation outside Bogota working to preserve Colomia’s rich biodiversity.<\/p>\n
One of the world’s most powerful and largest eagles, able to hunt monkeys and sloths, the harpy eagle has been hunted to near-extinction in some parts of its territory in Central America.<\/p>\n
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists it as vulnerable, saying the species was “rapidly declining” due to deforestation and hunting.<\/p>\n
Most of an estimated 100,000 to 250,000 individuals remain in the Amazon, which spans nine countries.<\/p>\n
Colombia’s only captive harpy eagle pair was rescued separately in the southern Amazonas state in 2018.<\/p>\n
– ‘A lot of hope’ –<\/p>\n
The female, with a prominent gray crest, still has pellets in her body from when she was shot. They cannot be removed without risk of death.<\/p>\n
The male, typically smaller, has a shattered left wing that veterinarians have been unable to repair.<\/p>\n
They were separated for two years by a metal fence, but it was finally opened three weeks ago after they were spotted bumping beaks and feeding each other.<\/p>\n
In other words, their keepers explained, they like each other.<\/p>\n
Monitored by security cameras, the next test will be if they mate. Harpy eagles are notoriously slow breeders, raising only one chick every few years.<\/p>\n
The couple’s behavior is “so calm… it generates a lot of hope that they will have a baby,” said Escobar, 26.<\/p>\n
One meter tall and with a wingspan of up to two meters, the harpy eagle is the symbol of Colombia’s airforce, and the national bird of Panama.<\/p>\n
Their habitat once stretched from Mexico to northern Argentina, but in some countries, like El Salvador, the birds have disappeared entirely.<\/p>\n
Poachers “kill them … because they want them as trophies. They want to sell them, eat them, or take a photo” with their remains, said Mateo Giraldo, from the Colombian Large Birds of Prey Project.<\/p>\n
Colombian authorities in 2021 seized 94 harpy eagle parts at the Bogota international airport.<\/p>\n
The armed conflict that has haunted Colombia for six decades also makes it hard for scientists to study the raptor deep in the forests where it lives, said Giraldo.<\/p>\n
Breeding chicks in captivity has proved successful in Panama and Brazil.<\/p>\n
atm\/fb\/des<\/p>\n<\/div>\n