Changing Eagle

Denise and I toured the Port Susan Bay Nature Conservancy this morning with some friends and Tom Isenberg. We saw many birds. Most memorable was a dark plumed Juvenile Bald Eagle. The first photo isn't mine. It shows a juvenile and mature Bald Eagle side by side.

"Immature bald eagles have a mixture of brown and white feathers, with a black beak and brown eyes in younger birds; some immature bald eagles have more mottling than others. Adult plumage develops when a bald eagle become sexually mature; it takes five years for a bald eagle to attain solid white head and tail feathers. For the first five years they gradually change; the beak turns from black to yellow, the eyes from brown to pale yellow, body feathers from mottled to dark brown, and head and tail feathers from mottled to solid white."