Our Earthly Cousins #3

My good friend who likes to take photos of our critter cousins has come through with a real gem:

Harpy Eagle, in "Rehab"
in Panama

The harpy eagle is the national bird of Panama and is depicted on its coat of arms. In its natural range ...

Range of Harpy Eagle

... there is a mostly rainforest habitat that the expansion of logging, cattle ranching, agriculture and prospecting has threatened to eliminate. In large parts of its range the bird has become a transient sight only; in Brazil, it has been all but totally wiped out from the Atlantic rainforest and is only found in numbers in the most remote parts of the Amazon Basin.

The clearing of the rainforest contributes mightily to carbon buildup in the atmosphere, which causes global warming. The harpy eagle has the honor of being a "poster child" in the fight against global warming and climate change. A harpy eagle named Hope, raised in captivity, was released into the Rio Bravo Conservation and Management Area in Belize. It was the fifteenth such eagle to be reintroduced into the Central American wild in hopes of reestablishing the species there. The timing of Hope's release was set to tie in with the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in 2009.