Legal action against eagle killing

The Wild Life Department is planning to take legal action against the person who killed an eagle in trying to protect his grandchild.

“We have to go according to procedures. There were no eyewitnesses and only the identity of the perpetrator. He said an eagle flew over his grandchild and he attacked the bird due to fear that it would harm him,” Udawalawe National Park Warden Upali Padmasiri said.

The incident had occurred on October 7 at Diyawinna, a village bordering the Udawalawe National Park.

It was a commonly found eagle in Sri Lanka of the species ‘White-belly Sea Eagle’ and was not a fully grown bird.

Dr. Vijitha Perera of the Wild Life Department said from its young days this bird had been illegally tamed by a person in Puttalam.

“He wanted to keep the eagle but as it was illegal, he gifted it to the Udawalawe National Park in early August. We released it to an elephant orphanage in the Udawalawe National Park so that it could return to the wild,” Dr.Perera said. However, the eagle was unable to adapt to wild life and flew over villages to find food. Once again, it was captured by the park management on October 6 and released near a Wild Life bungalow at Thimbiriya Mankada, far away from human settlements. However, it flew the next day over the village in search of food and was killed.

“It’s not a bird that is a danger to humans. This particular bird is tame and could not adapt to wild life,” Dr. Perera said.