Certain colors swell the hearts of Nebraskans: the red, white and blue of Old Glory; the sea of Cornhusker red for the homecoming game at Memorial Stadium; and lately, the bright white head and yellow beak of mature bald eagles, five years and older.

Singing of the National Anthem at Memorial Stadium averages 105 decibels during a football game. The sounds eagles make in their quieter domains require a closer listen; a gull-like “Peal Call”; the descending notes of a “Chatter Call”; and the “kuk-kuk-kuk” call.

America’s bird, the bald eagle is commonplace in Nebraska today, with more thriving nests than the state can count. Landing and taking off from their nests or seated on a branch as if posing for the cameras, they lift the spirits of patriots. The bald eagle has been America’s bird since 1782, when it became part of the Great Seal of the United States.

Not so long ago, you couldn’t see even one bald eagle in the wild in Nebraska.

One hundred fifty years of practice and policy – the loss of eagle habitat, aggressive hunting, and the pesticide DDT – made the eagle disappear.

The problem wasn’t just Nebraska’s, and neither was the solution. Federal law protected eagles (1940) and a federal ban on DDT took effect (1973). The first occupied eagle nest in Nebraska was spotted in 1991, 18 years after DDT use ended.

One nest wasn’t enough. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service set a goal for Nebraska of 10 active breeding pairs. And Nebraska answered the call. It reached the goal in five years. Twenty years later, by 2016, the number nearly tripled to 161. By 2019, the state estimated 300, some nesting in places that they hadn’t before. Eagles were adapting; they just needed a little help.

Bonnie James of North Platte noticed the change. She often visited Cody Park, along U.S. 83 and the North Platte River, with its antique carousel, a statue of “Wild Bill” Cody, and a railroad museum. She would bring her camera because she enjoys photographing wildlife migrating through there: duck, geese and peafowl.

In a 2014 visit to Cody Park, an eagle flew directly over James’ head with a duck’s head in its talon. Now she counts six active eagles’ nests. She’s seen eagles fighting over a goose, a reminder that eagles sometimes eat more than just fish.

Nebraskans are learning about eagles now that they encounter them wherever they live.

Tiara Brown of Omaha, an eighth-grade science teacher, learned that eagles, typically shy around humans, can adapt to humans in an urban setting. She finds them in a collection pond near her home.

Brown had her 2-year-old in a stroller and walked to the pond behind nearby restaurants where eagles land on their way to Chalco Hills Recreation Area in Sarpy County. “We walked to within 30-40 yards of the eagles, and they stuck around, letting us watch them,” Brown said. That’s rare, “especially with your kid there.”

Brown uses a Canon 80D to photograph eagles at Chalco Hills and Flannigan Lake, a flood-control reservoir in Omaha’s Papillion Creek Watershed. But on the day of her stroll, she had forgotten her camera. Her child will be too young to remember the moment. But all signs point to a thriving eagle population for years to come. Brown and her child will get another chance now because she won’t go for even a short stroll empty-handed.

Where there’s water, there are fish. And where there are fish, there are eagles. When Kingsley Dam – built in 1941 to form Lake Ogallala and Lake McConaughy – releases water, stirring Lake Ogallala, fish rise to the surface and eagles feast on them. But it wasn’t until 1996, the year Nebraska reached its goal for breeding pairs, that the Central Nebraska Public Power and Irrigation District built an eagle-viewing facility at Kingsley.

Teri Elmshaeuser, who’s worked for 16 years as a loan officer with Pinnacle Bank in Ogallala, took up photography as a hobby after her first husband died in 2005. When Kinsley Dam releases water, things get busy. When the dam is quiet, so is eagle activity. Whether busy or quiet, Elmshaeuser is poised. She opens the driver window of her Jeep Wrangler, a high-clearance vehicle that gives her a view above the weed line. Her camera is steadied and resting on a bean bag. It’s sunny, so her camera is set to freeze frame eagles in flight.

In photography, she’s self-taught. “I’ve taken a lot of bad pictures,” she said, but Elmshaeuser is tenacious, like America, like Nebraska, and like the eagles she observes, photographs and admires.