Fledgling bald eagle tempts fate as he practices flying and landing before leaving the Irvin Works nest

Ocho has been acting like the juvenile bald eagle he is these days, testing his boundaries.

As he does, Ocho has caused much angst for U.S. Steel Mon Valley Works Irvin Plant manager Don German, Steel City Eagles Facebook fans and others as they watch the steel corporation’s PixCams livestream on the West Mifflin nest.

As the 3-month-plus-a-few-days-old fledgling gains more feathers and flies around the plant and ever closer to the Monongahela River, he has been playing chicken with trains running along the tracks and hiding away from the nest. One day, as he practiced landing on what German and the bald eagle Facebook faithful call the bat branch near the nest, he took out his father, Irvin.

German said Ocho has aged him over the past few weeks, starting with one frightening episode. “He slipped and fell from the nest on Tuesday, June 17,” he wrote in an email. “He was branching for a week or so. Unfortunately, it was wet, and he slipped and fell about 60 feet.” German went behind the nest to check on the bird. “No damage to [his] wings or anything. He slept below the nest that night. Eventually he flew off the next day.”

Then came the fishing line and hook scare on June 24. Dad Irvin brought a fish back to the nest, and as Ocho started to eat from it, he almost ingested the line. Both of them sort of grabbed at the string, German said in an interview, and Irvin worked out the hook and the line and dropped it over the nest.

“This is the third year that Irvin brings in a fish with fishing tackle or fishing line to the nest.  Luckily, we’ve been blessed. Each time he’s dropped it,” the plant manager said.

KDKA-TV reporter Jessica Guay interviewed Tamarack Wildlife Center of Saegertown Executive Director Carol Holmgren about it, who said her “heart was in her throat” when she saw the fishing line entwined in the fish on the video. “And at one point, Ocho even had some line he was starting to swallow,” the wildlife rehabilitator told Guay. Irvin’s quick action averted disaster and swallowing injuries.  

Ocho is bouncing back, learning and landing great and getting his balance, German said, coming back to the nest at times. His parents sense where he is hanging out if he’s not there and leave food.

But the fledgling continues to tempt fate.

As Ocho practices his landings, one of the favorite spots has been on the railroad tracks. Union Railroad runs its trains slower near the nest area as its crews bring coal and coke to U.S. Steel’s Mon Valley Clairton Works and Edgar Thomson Plant. “They know the bald eagles are there,” German said.

Several times the conductors have had to do more than that, something that happened on Monday. “A conductor stopped the train, got out and shooed him off the tracks,” German said.

When he’s not causing his fans to bite their nails to nubs, Ocho will hang out on a line or pipe above the tracks, which Steel City Eagle Facebook fans document with screen grabs from the fixed cameras. One funny post on Wednesday captured Ocho on the tracks with a deer and wild turkey close by. “Maybe they are trying to catch the train out of town?” Lori Jean commented.

Despite these incidents, German said Ocho has ventured just about 500 yards of the nest. That will change. By the end of July German said Ocho will be heading down to the river, spending more time there and eventually out of three of the four fixed cameras’ views. His parents will be teaching him how to hunt for fish and more on his own.   

“Once he’s gone to the river, he won’t want to come back home,” the plant manager predicted. 

Good parents that they are, Irvin and Stella (who has replaced Claire at the Irvin Works nest) will continue their lessons and supervision until October. Then Ocho will set off on his own.