Here's some fresh footage of Murphy and his adopted eaglet that World Bird Sanctuary tweeted today. So far the eaglet doesn't have a name, but lots of folks are suggesting "Rocky," which to me seems perfect, since Murphy's journey to parenthood began last month when he tried incubating a rock. By all accounts, they continue to bond well! I'm so happy for them both! The Sanctuary also posted an update on their Facebook page:
We know everyone is very excited about Murphy and his charge and wants more and more photos and video of them, however, our first goal is to disturb them as little as possible. We do not have the bandwidth capacity for a live stream (we've tried everything, and we do have Starlink), and we are working on a good camera feed that can be recorded and transferred to social media. Please be patient with us, our staff is small and caring for our birds is job #1
If you're new to the story, here's a timeline of events, posted by World Bird Sanctuary on their Facebook page:
March 8 – Murphy begins incubating his rock / MurphyMania begins
April 2 – Orphaned Eaglet 23-126 arrives (1-2 weeks old) after nest is blown down in a storm
April 4 – Murphy is moved out of the shared eagle enclosure with RockBaby due to protecting his RockBaby too aggressively
April 6 – Eaglet is moved to the Baby Jail and into Murphy's enclosure to begin the bonding process. RockBaby is removed
April 13 – Eaglet is removed from Baby Jail and MURPHY FEEDS THE BABY
April 16 – Tornado lands close to The Sanctuary – all birds survive, eaglet is taken back to the hospital for care
April 17 – eaglet returned to Murphy after the nest is fortified and improved. Bonding resumes!
If you want to updates on Murphy's story, follow World Bird Sanctuary on Twitter or Facebook.