Eagle population growing

The number of bald eagles in the lower 48 U.S. states — a population once on the brink of extinction — has quadrupled in the last dozen years to more than 316,000, federal wildlife officials say, despite steep declines in other American bird populations. Mark Bush of Hazlehurst wouldn’t find that fact unusual as he spotted this bald eagle last week near the intersection of Yankee Paradise Road and Bush Road and snapped this photograph.