COMBINE, Texas — As Texans hunkered down for a winter storm, their hearts were warmed when a family of eagles welcomed two bundles of joy and feathers into the world.
Two eaglettes hatched less than 20 hours apart at the John Bunker Sands Wetland Center in Combine, 26 miles southeast of Dallas, this week. The older sibling, JBS 24, hatched in the afternoon on Sunday, Jan. 25, with JBS 25 making a fashionably late entrance on Monday morning.
The center streamed the hatchings with two eagle cams that had a perfect view of the snow-covered nest.
According to the center, both eagle parents were experienced and ready to care for the eaglettes, with the mom keeping them warm and fed and the dad bringing back a coot and a large fish for his family to feast on.
The eggs were laid 73.5 hours apart, and it seems the parents’ strategy was to incubate the first egg intermittently to slow its development and give the other egg time to catch up, the center said.
“JBS 24 is a bit larger and more mobile, but the development gap is substantially narrowed, helping JBS 25 successfully compete for food. The chicks are so close in size and development that we will soon have difficulty telling them apart. Perhaps they’ll show personality differences to help us ID them,” a Facebook post from the center said.
The center remained closed on Tuesday due to continued winter weather, but you can watch the eaglettes continue to develop on camera 1 and camera 2.