Sunday, June 8, 2008

Bald eagle gets new faux beak

Beauty the eagle has gone from being peaky to beaky after an operation to save her life. The bird of prey was slowly starving to death after a poacher shot her upper beak off three years ago. But thanks to a team of volunteers an artificial beak has been attached to the 15-pound (7-kilogram) eagle helping her to grasp food.
Nate Calvin, an engineer from Boise in Idaho, designed the new beak, which will eventually be replaced with a permanent tougher one. Despite the success of the operation, the bird will never be released back into the wild because she has spent too much time with humans and the final beak will not be strong enough to tear flesh from prey.

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