Citizen Potawatomi Nation Tribal members released two young golden eagles on a blustery October morning in the Big Belt Mountains.
Citizen Potawatomi Nation member Jennifer Randell, given name KnoKwe, or Eagle Woman, was there.
“It was just incredible,” she said.
Eagles have a spiritual and cultural significance for the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, based in Oklahoma.
“We believe the eagle flies so high that they can see the face of a Creator and therefore they hand our prayers off. So, we feel it’s our responsibility as the Potawatomi people to always get the eagle back out there if we can,” she said.
Randell is the director of the Tribal eagle aviary, where the two months-old birds were born.
“We don’t have a big population of golden eagles in Oklahoma, mainly because we don’t have the terrain, the environment that they would like to nest in,” said Randell.
The aviary coordinated the conservation effort with Montana’s Raptor View Research Institute. Executive Director Rob Domenech said the Big Belt Mountains is a busy area for eagles, part of what’s called the golden highway.
“It’s basically the largest concentration of migratory golden eagles known on Earth,” said Domenech.
The birds are Némkis, or Little Thunder, and Mnotägwzekwe, She Brings the Good News. They’re both wearing devices that allow the experts to track their progress.
