Photos submitted for publication The eagle was transported to Tamarack Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center.

On election night, Nov. 8, Cinnamon Becker came across a bald eagle on the ground during a trail ride in Scandia.

Her videos on Facebook detail the events of the day, from finding the eagle to the point when Game Commission WCO Matt Savinda captured the raptor, which was unable to fly and appeared injured in some way.

Becker handled the situation exactly as both the Game Commission and Tamarack Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center instruct: Do not handle the animal. If you have handled it, stop and keep it in an enclosed area in a dark place until someone trained in handling it arrives. Call the Game Commission or Tamarack (or another  trained facility).

The eagle, according to Carol Holmgren, licensed wildlife rehabilitator at Tamarack in Saegertown, was transported by Savinda that night and admitted to the Tamarack facility.

“As soon as we pulled her out,” said Holmgren, “we heard a respiratory sound that’s associated with high levels of lead poisoning.” And although Holmgren handles many large, fascinating birds every day, many with the same condition, “my heart just sank,” she said. “This was a particularly large full adult female and she just took my breath away.”

A physical examination of the eagle was conducted, Holmgren said, revealing that the bird had no fractures or signs of trauma. Yet, said Holmgren, she was unable to fly. And there was that concerning respiratory sound. Through the support of a donor and individual memberships, Holmgren said, Tamarack was able to purchase a machine to run blood tests on admitted animals.

Holmgren said before they had the tools to do this testing there were several cases where an animal was admitted and suspected of having lead poisoning, but no real way for Tamarack to confirm it. The facility is also required to replace its stock of compound drugs every three months so that if a patient needing chelation therapy is admitted, it can be done.

Chelation has been the standard of care in heavy metal poisoning for a long time. The treatment involves the injection of a typically organic chelate – an ion or molecule – into the system of a patient with heavy metal in their system. Chelates are chosen depending on their affinities and chemical properties. There are a number of chelating agents that have affinities for lead. Through chelation, a chelate is injected which then binds with heavy metals in the system, preventing them from binding to other agents. This is important, because ingestion of heavy metals causes the body to absorb them, and rapidly, according to a recent presentation by Dave McRuer, DVM, MSc, DACVPM, and director of veterinary services at the Wildlife Center of Virginia.

According to McRuer, depending on factors such as GI transit time, the amount of lead ingested, and the surface area of the garment, lead fragments can be absorbed especially quickly in eagles, hawks, falcons, and vultures, as their stomachs are more acidic than others of the raptor species such as owls, and therefore metabolize the metals much more rapidly. Once absorbed, McRuer says, lead binds to red blood cells, which circulate throughout the body and permeate all organs and systems in the body. Ultimately, he says, lead is stored after absorption in one of three places: blood and organs, soft tissue and nerves, and bone.

Where lead is stored matters. Only four percent of lead is stored in blood and organs, and two percent stored in soft tissue and nerves. A staggering 94 percent of lead absorbed into the system is stored in bone. The half-life of lead once stored in these compartments is weeks in the blood, months in the soft tissue, and years in the bone. And since the vast majority of absorbed lead is stored in bone, the vast majority of it continues to act on the body systems for months or more.

It takes very little lead to cause immediate and cumulative effects, McRuer said. Depending on weight, species, prior history of exposure, and the individual that ingested it, according to McRuer, less than 100 milligram can kill an eagle. That means a 150-grain lead bullet can kill more than ten eagles depending on the amount ingested. That’s the same as two to three standard number 6 lead shot.

The organ systems most effected by lead absorption, McRuer said, are numerous and the effects are devastating. Red blood cells effected by lead are less effectively produced, causing anemia and reduced ability of the blood to carry oxygen throughout the body. Lead prevents motility (movement) of the gastrointestinal system. Neurologically, it interferes with nerve transmission, causing muscle weakness, seizures, and blindness. It can decrease mineralization in the bone, and can actually destroy red blood cells, which in turn destroys blood vessels, can decrease cardiac conduction, degrade neural structures, and cause kidney damage in mammals.

Most cases of lead poisoning in raptors, according to McRuer, are acute. That’s a large amount of lead ingested over a short period of time. Clinical signs of acute lead poisoning in birds like eagles, he said, can include good body condition, hock sitting, drooped wings, dull mentation, a blind stare into the air, slow and prolonged breathing patterns, and green urine. With more than 60 micrograms per decileter of lead in the blood, McRuer said, prognosis is grave, survivors have poor stamina, and are often blind not to mention non-releasable.

According to Holmgren, the eagle Becker found in Scandia had more lead in her blood than their machine even tests – more than 65 micrograms per deciliter.

“She needed chelation,” said Holmgren, which was started immediately, along with rehydration therapy, subcutaneously. But the radiographs showed that the lead was still present in her system – specifically in her gizzard (stomach) and intestines. “The lead in the gizzard was obviously more concerning,” said Holmgren. “The gizzard is acidic,” she said, meaning that it will continue to break down the lead for absorption whereas the intestines, which are non-acidic, will not.

“We needed to do everything we could to get (the lead) out and stop the absorption,” said Holmgren.

There are two strategies to getting ingested lead out of a bird’s system, she said. The first, and more aggressive, is to sedate and intubate the bird and place it on an incline, flushing the stomach with warm fluids. Holmgren said that the likelihood that Becker’s eagle would survive the process was incredibly low. The second method, which Tamarack went forward with, is to feed non-digestible material to the bird to act as another binding agent. The non-digestible material will then be cast up, as raptors regurgitate that material just as an owl would, in a pellet. “We fed her rat skins,” said Holmgren, adding that the hair is a non-digestible material for eagles, and that she would ideally cast up one pellet a day full of lead using this method.

“Unfortunately,” said Holmgren, “she was affected so heavily that she immediately regurgitated the skins,” meaning that there wasn’t time for any toxins to bind to the hair. The reaction was a result of the lead’s effect on the bird’s gastrointestinal motility. ” In consultation with veterinarians specializing in treatment of lead toxicity, and knowing she had severe irreversible brain damage, she was humanely euthanized with love and respect. She is no longer suffering and her spirit is free,” Holmgren wrote on the Tamarack Facebook page on the morning of Friday, Nov. 11.

Becker, who found the eagle and wanted desperately to help it, said, “It’s very emotional for me. It’s heartwrenching. So many people got involved and she died anyway.”

She said that she wants people to be aware of the way lead affects “more than just your kill,” when hunting. Historically, lead has gotten into the environment through things like the dumping of household paint and gasoline leaks, but currently, according to McRuer, “extensive evidence implicating lead ammunition” has been compiled. Like Becker’s eagle, many raptors are found through radiographs to have lead fragments in their GI tracts, and there is a relationship, McRuer said, between foraging preferences for big game and lead-related mortality in scavengers. Correlations of stable isotopes between blood and feather samples and lead ammunition is another clue that McRuer said is strengthening the hypothesis that hunting may be a source.

And even if birds aren’t eating lead bullets, as Northwest Region Pennsylvania Game Commission Wildlife Conservation Officer Eric McBride, feels strongly isn’t happening, according to McRuer, lead ammunition can fragment and wind up in the tissue of kills up to 15 centimeters from a wound, and is worse when ammunition hits a bone. It’s these smaller fragments that McRuer said are most likely to be consumed by scavengers, and these fragments are small enough, he says, to be undetectable while chewing.

McRuer and McBride differ on their suspicion of lead in ammunition causing the lead poisoning that’s been increasingly more visible in the eagle populations of this area. McRuer cites gut piles left behind by hunters while field dressing harvested animals, as well as animals wounded by lead shot and never recovered, and “nuisance animals” that are shot and left.

“From being out there,” said McBride, “I just feel like there’s just got to be something else going on.” He added that while many people think of eagles as fish-eaters, and while he said they certainly can be, “but around here we see a lot of scavenging.” McBride said, “It’s not uncommon to see eagles with lead poisoning. What the source is I can’t tell you.”

Either way, said Becker, “For me, I just want to raise awareness to those who use lead in their ammo. I’m a hunter, my family is a family of hunters, but hunt responsibly.”

Holmgren added that many individual hunters and hunting groups support Tamarack, which is a nonprofit that depends on membership and donations to do what it does. “But they aren’t aware of the effects of the lead in their ammunition. Hunters are some of the greatest conservationists, and most want to do everything they can,” she said. “They just need to be aware to use non-lead ammunition or bury their gut piles.”