The eagle has landed a huge fish! Moment a bald eagle swims ashore dragging a 20lb carp
This is the moment a determined bald eagle pulled a large fish from a lake but had to swim to get its hefty catch to dry land.
Footage captured on Lake Chippewa in Wisconsin shows the bird of prey paddling towards the shore with its huge wings while clutching a 20lb carp in its talons.
The bald eagle releases the fish onto the beach before tucking in.
The clip starts with the bird of prey swimming through the water using its powerful wings as its white head bobs up and down rhythmically. The amazed filmer shouts: 'Oh my god!'
The bald eagle pulls a large carp from Lake Chieppewa in Wisconsin before eating its prey
The bird of prey swims towards the shore using its powerful wings while clutching a 20lb carp in its talons
Just moments later, the large carp is spotted in the eagle's enormous talons as the bird continues to drag its meal through the water.
As the eagle draws closer to the shore, the filmer says: 'Look at that big fish! See it?That is insane! It's still alive. Is it flapping? Oh my god!'
The filmer said: 'We were sitting in the living room with a view of the lake and noticed an eagle swimming towards our beach.
'At first, I thought it was hurt but then it swam to shore with a 20lb carp in its talons.
'It sat on the shore and ate the fish for a couple of hours and then came back in the morning and finished eating the carp. It was truly an amazing sight to see!'
The bald eagle, which is found across regions in North America including Canada and Alaska, is an opportunist feeder and usually survives on fish - which it snatches from the water with its talons.
Swimming is not an unusual activity for the species, who are open-water foragers and typically weigh between 6-13lbs, and they will often catch fish straight out of rivers and lakes using their talons before swimming to shore due to the weight of the fish.
In 2019, eagle researcher Jim Watson from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife told Aspen Public Radio that eagles start swimming because 'their feathers get soaked and they can't fly away'.
He said: 'Throughout the years I've seen them swim a lot of times and usually it's because they fly out and attempt to catch a fish in the water and maybe get waterlogged.'
The bird of prey, who have an average wingspan of around 5-7ft, travel at around 30 miles-per-hour in regular flight and can fly more than 30 miles in a day, using its sharp eyesight to spot its next catch.
It can also soar more than 10,000ft high and can spot fish fish up to a mile away.
The large bird draws closer to the shore and pulls the carp from the water using its talons
The creature forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle - the largest bird of prey in the UK, which was recently reintroduced after becoming extinct in the country 240 years ago.
Species pairs are anatomically and chemically similar, if not identical.
Despite its name, bald eagles are not actually bald and usually have white feathers on their head.
Their name comes from the old English word - piebald - which means 'white-headed' rather than hairless.
Despite being America's national symbol, bald eagles were facing extinction in the mid-twentieth-century.
However conservation efforts in the past 25 years have led to significant increases in the population and in 2007, the bald eagle was officially removed from the List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife.
Following the clip, viewers shared their awe at seeing the bird of prey swimming through the water, with one calling the scenes 'amazing'.
One viewer wrote: 'He used his wings like arms to do a front stroke while dragging a fish through the water. Amazing.'
The bald eagle sits by the shore with the fish before eating its freshly caught meal
Viewers shared their awe at seeing the bird of prey swimming through the water
While another commented: 'Didn't even know eagles could swim.'
Another person added: 'And now I've officially seen that eagles can swim elegant and gracefully with their wings.'
The scene comes just weeks after a bald eagle managed to pluck a duck from the surface Dale Hollow Reservoir in Tennessee.
The bird had been flying about 30ft above the water when it swooped down and caught the duck.
After a few seconds, the powerful eagle flapped its wings and flew off with the doomed duck held in its talons.
The bald eagle stalks a flock of ducks on Dale Hollow Reservoir in Tennessee before swooping down and scooping up the duck
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