Xcel Energy Eagle Cam
Eagle Cam
Active: February - May
Fort St. Vrain Station, Platteville, CO
Our Eagle Cam features a bald eagle nest at Xcel Energy’s Fort St. Vrain Station near Platteville, Colorado. A small camera has been mounted on a tree limb about six feet above the next. A solar panel with storage batteries powers the camera and associated equipment, and a video signal from the camera is sent to a wireless transmitter that sends the signal to a receiver at the plant. To help conserve power, a photocell shuts down the system at dusk and turns it back on just before dawn. Nesting season is a sensitive time for eagles. If you live in the area, we ask that you not try to visit the nest on our property. Bald eagles need quiet and privacy to breed and raise their young. Please enjoy them from your computer! In addition to providing streaming video, photos for the day are saved in two-minute increments and are archived in the Daily Pix section. Local time, Mountain Standard Time (MST), is used for these images.
Daily Pix
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Latest News
We have eaglets in the nest at Fort St. Vrain Station. The first egg hatched on Friday, April 4; the second on Sunday, April 6; and the third on Tuesday, April 8. We now get to watch them grow and develop over the next 10 to 12 weeks before fledging.
Mother eagle continues to incubate her three eggs, despite crazy spring weather in Colorado. Look for the eggs to hatch in early April. We have experienced some technical problems with streaming video from the Eagle Cam. It's not always operational, and we're working to resolve the problem.
The bald eagles at Fort St. Vrain Station in Platteville, CO, have nested. The female bird laid her first egg on Wednesday, February 27, 2008 and the second on Saturday, March 1, 2008. On Tuesday, March 4, 2008 a third egg appeared in the nest -- this is special for bald eagles to have a clutch with three eggs. Back in 2006, the pair of eagles in this nest raised three eaglets, so maybe it's not unusual for this bird and this nest. We expect to see new eaglets sometime the first week of April. We have experienced some technical problems with streaming video from the Eagle Cam. It's not always operational, and we're working to resolve the problem.
The Bald Eagles at Fort St. Vrain are making more frequent visits to the nest. They are busy with nest improvement projects, adding and moving sticks and things around. Comparing their behavior this year to previous years, we expect to see eggs sometime the first week of March.
A pair of bald eagles spend most of the day in the area around the nest at Fort St. Vrain Station and visit the nest nearly everyday between 8 and 10 a.m. Last year the eggs were laid in early March.
About Eagle Cam
This pair of bald eagles lives at our Fort St. Vrain Station in Platteville, Colorado. Their 6-foot-wide by 5-foot-deep nest sits high in a cottonwood tree near the plant. Eagles return to the nest in the fall and conduct nesting activities from about February to June. The nest has been active for years, with the Colorado Division of Wildlife banding young birds at the nest site each spring.
Interested in corresponding with other Bird Cam viewers? Join the BirdCam Forum available through the Raptor Resource Project.
Eagle Facts
- Have vision four times sharper than humans.
- The Bald Eagle is the only eagle unique to North America.
- Have been known to live up to 50 years in captivity.
- Eat primarily fish and have the ability to swim.
- Nests are repaired and refurbished each year, growing in size, and have been known to reach a weight of two tons.
