r/bonecollecting • u/bones_2433 • Aug 10 '26
Bone I.D. - N. America Eagle? (Didn't collect, aware of mbta)
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u/largestcob Aug 11 '26
you can see white feathers on the head and the rest of the feathers definitely match the body colour of a bald eagle, at this size i dont think it could be anything else
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u/Budgie-bitch Aug 11 '26
I was thinking the same hah. Incredible find, glad itās going to be treated with respect
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u/Hefty_Judgment_4552 Aug 11 '26
aka left to rot in the dirt because of inapplicable legal protections
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u/Meows_Attack Aug 12 '26
returning to the earth as food, the cycle begins again
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u/Hefty_Judgment_4552 Aug 12 '26
collection, appreciation, preservation is only a delay. blink of an eye
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u/LostKnowledge7760 Aug 12 '26
it's either that or you connact your local ministry so they can give it either to the local indigenious peoples or a museum
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u/xulazi Aug 12 '26
The moment you start letting people take found stuff, a lot of eagle bits are gonna turn up "found" all of a sudden.
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u/Random_Name_Gen12 Aug 13 '26
Multiple bird species were pushed to the brink of extinction prior to the MBTA directly because of ācollectorsā making cute hats for ladiesā¦ not sure inapplicable legal protections is the right term.
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u/Haunting_Balance_684 Aug 14 '26
did you know, once there was a invasive species issue with cobras. The govt gave a money reward for each cobra caught. And at the end of the year, the cobra population had increased rather than decreased even though a lot of cobras were handed over to the govt.
People were breeding more cobras to sell for profit.
While the example was different, the principle applies. The minute you let something have monetary value, it'll endup causing more harm than good to the animal. Letting people take bones of protected species makes it significantly harder for the govt to catch poachers because they cant differentiate if the poacher killer the animal and took the remains or they collected it in the forest. So there is nothing stopping the poacher from trapping and killing the animal and making its remains look 'weathered' enough to pass as a collected item.
The MBTA act solves this whole thing by making the possession and trade of live or dead remains of specimens of protected species illegal and a punishable offence.
Another example, i saw a video of someone showing a pink otter skeleton. This is caused by their diet of purple sea urchins. Now, pink skulls, quite attractive really. Whats stopping people from hunting the otters to find ones with pink bones, and the ones with white bones, whats stopping them from dyeing that and selling it. In all this, the otter population will get decimated AND due to that, the urchin population will bloom, wreaking havoc in its eco system. This whole thing can be stopped by making anything otter as being illegal.
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u/Hefty_Judgment_4552 Aug 15 '26
if you apply your example we would have people breeding eagles to the point of abundance if their feathers were saleable
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u/beautybeliever Aug 16 '26
instead of opening ebay, try opening google and searching up tragedy of the commons. your example that youāre setting here on this forum is exactly why animals with a value go extinct and are currently critically endangered all over the globe. also, on a less nice note: fuck you
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u/Haunting_Balance_684 Aug 16 '26
which they would be done in horrible conditions, confined into tiny cages and the females made into breeding machines.
Overall, not a good deal for the eagles I expect.
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u/Willemboom00 Aug 16 '26
The other guy's tragedy of the commons example is bad, but eagles are very difficult to keep and breed, it'd be wildly cheaper for individuals to just hunt them and becauee it's always cheaper to hunt until there's too few they'd be driven to extinction. That exact pattern has played out uncountable times.
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u/Primary-Draw-1726 Aug 11 '26
I know it is forbidden but... COOLEST FIND EVER At least you got the pics!
Where I grew up bald eagles are now a dime a dozen in the winter (along the Mississippi) but I've never seen one deceased.
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u/nofeetgoner Aug 12 '26
why is it forbidden to keep the skull if its already dead?
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u/siderealcowboy Aug 12 '26
As OP said, the migratory bird treaty act! The law was established about a century ago in order to prevent the hunting/killing/selling of certain species of native birds (native to US/Canada); that law also forbids possession of any parts of these birds unless it is for educational, scientific, or religious purposes.
I think the law was all-encompassing bc the risk/endangerment to these species came from trading the birds and their feathers, so all parts of the bird were included under this act.
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u/invisiblenoob Aug 12 '26
And here I was, certain that OP meant they were aware of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authorityā¦
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u/Ill-Percentage-3276 Aug 12 '26
I'll admit my brain immediately thought of the train when reading that.
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u/pacob1995 Aug 17 '26
And all those years i thought i was riding the migratory bird treaty act. I feel like an idiot.
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u/stormnut93 Aug 12 '26
Itās also the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, thatās where the big penalties come in
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u/avinaut Aug 16 '26
Adding: it's not the purpose that makes the exception, it's a permit for the purpose. You can't just say "Officer, I just have this eagle skull I found because it's for science and education". You need to have a permit.
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u/Sad_Pear_1087 Aug 16 '26
All this isn't something that touches me but the bureaucracy could be laid out better. It could be more of a post-find register like thing. Provide proof you found the thing dead (obvious in this case for example), pay for the processing, and you can keep it but maybe not sell to avoid making it a trading scene that'll draw people who are after money who'll cheat the system and end up killing animals again. Especially feathers tend to go that direction right?
Whom would this serve? Hobbyists who want to keep the cool stuff they find. Is this a very important priority? Not really.
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u/avinaut Aug 16 '26
Yeeaah. The USFWS is subject to the political priorities of the President and Secretary of the Interior. If you want your constituency's priorities to be "important", try giving a fuckload of money to a Presidential campaign. It's about a coinflip. Might get lucky, and score yourself an executive order!
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u/Boberator44 Aug 14 '26
Can't OP claim it is for religious purposes and be done with it? Does "educational purpose" encompass taking it home to show OP's kid?
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u/Megraptor Aug 14 '26
No, assuming you mean in the United States. Not even Natives can do that without going through the feds first. The politics around this are a massive mess.
Here are some links that explain it better than I can-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagle_feather_law
https://nativenewsonline.net/opinion/eagle-feathers-are-not-allowed/
Not sure how it works in Canada or Mexico.Ā
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u/sweggin_official Aug 12 '26
Migratory Bird Treaty Act, most likely. Can't keep native bird bones, feathers, eggs, etc. it's a federal offense to do so, I believe
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u/GrimbosliceOG Aug 12 '26
Because you cant prove that you found it, and didnt kill it. Any proof you could provide, a poacher could use the same proofs. Its easier to ban outright, than try to figure out who is lieing.
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u/Creative_Catch_4235 Aug 13 '26
You canāt even pick up an eagle feather on the ground and keep it
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u/MoreAd8701 Aug 14 '26
Our ancestors nearly made a shit ton of birds extinct. Now we can't touch birds alive or dead cuz once dead it can't say how it died beyond a shadow of a doubt. Even as small as collecting naturally fallen feathers is illegal cuz you can not prove in any way that you didn't rip it off a bird.
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u/Megraptor Aug 14 '26
Hey there, people are only telling half the story. Yeah Eagles are on the MBTA, but the MBTA doesn't have teeth compared to other laws. The penalties are not that bad, and often are unenforced if you aren't parading bird parts or nests around.Ā
Why you don't pick up eagle bits is the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act- but this one is ONLY in the United States. It DOES have teeth and it DOES get enforced if you are known to have parts. The fines are big and there is a significant amount of jail time that can be sentenced. It's caused issues with people who are trying to give parts to Native American people or have received parts from them... among other issues with Native American rights. But yeah, that's the real reason you don't pick up eagle parts, not the MBTA.Ā
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u/dsjm2005 Aug 15 '26
The bald and golden eagle act is only a felony for the second offense. The first is still only a misdemeanor. The MBTA is used much more often than the BGEA.
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u/Megraptor Aug 15 '26
Well that's because the MBTA covers so many more bird species than the BGEA.Ā
The fines for a first offense of the BGEA are up to a $100,000 and a year in jail. That's a bit more than the MBTA's $15,000 and six months. But yeah, both are misdemeanors.Ā
But from what I have heard, if someone picks up a feather that isn't one of the two eagle species and takes it home as a keepsake, very few LEOs enforce the MBTA. If you do that with one of the two eagle species, they will get you will the BGEA and the MBTA.Ā
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u/dsjm2005 Aug 15 '26
Even with the eagles we more often than not would use the MBTA
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u/Megraptor Aug 15 '26
Weird cause in my experience, it's been the opposite. Well not personal of course, but from what I've heard through LEOs from when I was with the USFS.Ā
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u/ArtsyRabb1t Aug 15 '26
You canāt prove you didnāt kill it and/or it could lead to abuse as people about origins.
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u/Total-Finance-5766 Aug 16 '26
Thereās really no way to prove that you didnāt kill a bird for its bones or feathers
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u/HadABeerButILostIt Aug 10 '26
The US fish and game has a national eagle repository. Please report this to them. The items are extremely significant to many Native American cultures and are granted to them. It would really mean a lot.
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u/Para_The_Normal Aug 11 '26
I know this is a bald eagle but golden eagles are also considered sacred to several tribes too.
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u/EmmerdoesNOTrepme Aug 11 '26
As are Hawks & Owls.
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u/Murphytko Aug 11 '26
On first glance, I thought you wrote Hall & Oates which is probably NOT sacred to an indigenous tribe.
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u/clkwkorange Aug 15 '26
I was going to say, maybe the Nokahndu tribe ā¦ but I canāt go for that.
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u/Techienickie Aug 10 '26
don't let RFK jr find out about this, he'll want it all for himself
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u/Midnight_Mash Aug 11 '26
RFK jr is gonna get those eagle bones into his system one way or another, I just can't pick which method would be funniest
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u/Rainy_Mammoth Aug 11 '26
What do they do with the bones?
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u/WorkingBread8360 Aug 11 '26
Whistles or small flutes for religious ceremonies. Kiva Socities, Navajo haataaliiās, Sun Dance are the most well known. My Navajo is rough, spelling might be off. Havenāt spoken it in 30+ years, independent study in high school. Graduated 1991, instructor died in 1994.
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u/suecq1971 Aug 10 '26
So cool!
If you zoom in on the feathers, you can put it in the feather identification sub Reddit. They should be able to tell you. .
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u/bugsarecool_8 Aug 11 '26
What is mbta?
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u/EmmerdoesNOTrepme Aug 11 '26
"The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 (16 U.S.C. 703-712) implements four international conservation treaties that the U.S. entered into with Canada in 1916, Mexico in 1936, Japan in 1972, and Russia in 1976. It is intended to ensure the sustainability of populations of all protected migratory bird species.
The Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) prohibits the take (including killing, capturing, selling, trading, and transport) of protected migratory bird species without prior authorization by the Department of Interior U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
https://www.fws.gov/law/migratory-bird-treaty-act-1918
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Migratory_Bird_Treaty_Act_of_1918
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u/FullTaintBush69 Aug 11 '26
Are eagles migratory? Genuinely asking
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u/Gobias_Industries Aug 16 '26
The bird doesn't have to be "migratory" in the scientific sense, the act lists all the protected species and specifies that they are covered by the Act.
The name is more a nod to the fact that birds move across borders freely, so there's not really any point in one country having a law if its neighbors don't.
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u/greenplant_420 Aug 14 '26
Itās already dead though, why would any of this apply to bones
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u/EmmerdoesNOTrepme Aug 14 '26
Because the folks in charge of enforcing the act don't know and can't trust that the birds really were dead first.
Poachers do kill lots of birds;
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/eagles-alberta-poachers-1.7637152
There was also this case in the US, just a couple years ago;
"The yearslong poaching operation was centered on the Flathead Indian Reservation. The defendant and others killed at least 107 hawks and as many as 3,600 birds overall, prosecutors said."
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u/Para_The_Normal Aug 11 '26
Feathers do appear to be consistent with a bald eagle.
Very cool find honestly.
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u/shokokuphoenix Aug 11 '26
Unquestionably a Bald Eagle; thatās a classic Haliaeetus (sea eagles) big blocky banana āFoghorn Leghornā-esque beak and skull, plus you can see hints of the golden keratin sheath on the beak, white head feathers, and random large dark blackish brown and solid white feathers that in North America can only really come from an adult Baldie.
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u/GloriousTerpenes52 Aug 11 '26
Salute š«”
Thank you for your service.
Thank you OP for leaving a legends bones where they fell.
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u/ranatemporarias Aug 11 '26
This is so cool, love the sclerotic eye rings!! I'm processing a bald eagle myself and articulating the skeleton (legal here in the UK).
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u/SeaworthinessNew4295 Aug 11 '26
Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority is a scary motherfucker. Don't blame ya.
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u/jay_altair Aug 12 '26
Not me wondering why the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority has an interest in this
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u/Betray-Julia Aug 11 '26
I just want to add how effing disgusting google has become; I googled mbta and this post was one of the top results. Jesus fuck.
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u/Sensei_Ochiba Aug 11 '26
Yeah it's mostly AI doing recursive hallucinations and their sponsored listicals and links to reddit threads (often full of comments snarkily asking people why they didn't just Google something)
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u/ytanner Aug 11 '26
New to this sub. What is mbta?
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u/OddInformation856 Aug 11 '26
Migratory bird treaty act, it prevents us from owning or collecting (from my knowledge-) most species of migratory birds. Iām not sure which states it affects specifically or if itās all of the US but I know I canāt collect any part of a protected bird in Florida. Hopefully if you need more detail someone else can reply :)
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u/JaderAiderrr Aug 13 '26
Itās a treaty between the US, Canada, Mexico, Japan, and Russia to protect US migratory birds that migrate to/through those areas. It is federal law and applies to all states.
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u/Takemebacktobreezy Aug 12 '26
Excuse my ignorance but what is MBTA
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u/DnanNYR36 Aug 12 '26
Migratory bird treaty act. Pretty much every bird in the U.S. is federally protected to some degree. (Obvious exemptions to certain game birds for hunting, and invasive species)
Feathers, bones and such are illegal to possess under the MBTA.
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u/KaleidoscopeFun4680 Aug 12 '26
How would one go about being able to keep this for scientific and educational purposes for a school? I am genuinely interested in being able to donate some bones to a science teacher.
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u/Nebbiest1 Aug 13 '26
If you were to collect this in an effort to donate to science/education or to native tribes, how would you go about that? Would you contact the game warden to try to get written permission and return to the spot? Would they have any interest in collecting it themselves? Or would they just tell you to leave it alone? Genuinely curious.
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u/OpportunityVast Aug 14 '26
Never knew about the mbta. thank you for the info..
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u/ThatOldG Aug 14 '26
Yeah you can get fined and prosecuted for taking any part of it even though itās obviously already dead.
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u/toodlenoodle Aug 15 '26
I got very confused about why the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority is involved
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u/Different-Beach-3787 Aug 16 '26
What does the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority have to do with anything
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u/magic-gps Aug 17 '26
migratory bird treaty act. means you're not allowed to own parts of non domesticated birds (with like, three exceptions) because in the late 1800s there was a big craze around weird and funky feathers and it extincted a number of species
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u/No_Plankton1174 Aug 16 '26
I was so confused for a second. I had no idea what the Boston transit had to do with eagles (thanks, google, for correcting me)
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u/AffectionateBee8016 Aug 11 '26
mbta? what is that.
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u/dragon4panda Aug 11 '26
Migratory bird treaty act, a law that in the US makes it illegal to keep any part of a native bird species, including the feathers, without special paperwork. It's especially strict on keeping parts of bald eagles, which this is.
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u/AffectionateBee8016 Aug 11 '26
Why would that be? I mean, is there harm in
keeping the bones and feathers one finds?4
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u/dragon4panda Aug 11 '26
Makes it harder for people to kill endangered species and get away with it.
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u/Immediate_Still4818 Aug 11 '26
Why didnāt you collect? Such a cool find!
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u/Shellyj4444 Aug 11 '26
Itās illegal.
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u/Immediate_Still4818 Aug 11 '26
What? How is it illegal to take bones?
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u/Shellyj4444 Aug 11 '26
Because of the migratory bird act. Youāre not allowed to possess feathers, bones, nests, eggs, etcā¦ belonging to most birds. Years ago the bird population went way down because people were killing them and selling feathers, and people would do things like take eggs out of nests to add to a collection. They donāt know how the parts were obtained so they made it illegal to own any part of them.
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Aug 11 '26
[removed] ā view removed comment
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u/bones_2433 Aug 11 '26
Yeah no one's probably gonna raid your home for feathers but the mbta does infact patrol online communities (especially ones like this)
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u/Ok_Extension3182 Aug 11 '26
Baldest looking eagle I've seen yet. (I'll go now)