“My grandma was hiking up at our cabin and she found the eagle,” Charlie said.

“She called my papa and he called the Game Commission who called Red Creek Wildlife Center,” he added.

Michelle and Jeff Webb are Charlie’s grandma and papa, and they were at their family’s cabin in Shunk where the eagle was discovered, Charlie explained.

Once the wildlife center had the eagle in their care, it was determined that it had a high level of lead poisoning.

Reagan Brown, Charlie Webb, and Lola Savage-Caruso have made it their goal to help rehabilitate an injured eagle that was found on Charlie Webb’s family property near Shunk recently. The trio of students from Ashkar Elementary lead fund raising efforst to get supplies to help the Red Creek Wildlife Center bring the eagle back to good health after being effected by lead poisoning. DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

In eagles and other species of birds, lead poisoning is often caused by feeding on an animal, such as a deer, that has been shot with a bullet containing lead or by lead tackle left behind by anglers.

“It was a girl. It could have been about to lay eggs,” Charlie said.

When Charlie shared the story at school, Reagan Brown, a fellow student in Jessica Tagliaferri’s class decided that something should be done to help the eagle in its recovery.

“I wanted to do it because I felt so bad for the eagle. I wanted to figure something out so we could raise money. I told Charlie, and then he thought it was a good idea,” Reagan said.

The students put their request in a letter to their principal, Jill Warg, and then waited for a reply.

“We kept going on and on and on until she said yes,” Reagan said.

The students were very persistent in pursuing their project.

“They wrote a letter to the principal but she was out that day, so they were really sure the next day, ‘can we go back down and check to see if she got our letter,” said their teacher.

“They didn’t let it go until they got a response that it was passed on up the chain to see if they can do it. And then they still kept checking in. When they finally got the yes, they were cheering and the whole class started cheering and they wanted to get started right away on flyers,” she said.

The students had decided to sponsor a dress down day where everyone in the school was to pay to wear pajamas to school for that day.

“It was a cute little thing because we put up posters and it said that we’re doing a fundraiser — ‘Bring in money to help the Ashkar Eagle,'” Lola said.

The response was overwhelming for these young animal lovers.

“We raised over $900 for it,” Reagan said.

The medication that the eagle needed for treatment was about $450 per bottle, plus the money raised was needed to pay for food during its recuperation.

Another student, Lola Caruso, was in charge of writing a letter to the wildlife center explaining what the school had done to raise money for the eagle.

“I might not get this, like all the things right, but this is what I memorized,” Lola said.

“I said, ‘Dear Red Creek Wildlife Center. We decided to come up with the fundraiser. And we raised over $900. We hope this can give you more money for other animals to help. And enough for the eagle to get a bottle or more bottles,'” Lola said.

“I made the letter because I wanted them to know what’s going on — who wrote it to them, what school it was,” she said.

“They really took matters into their own hands. I mean, just to take that from that story and go with it and not stop until they got what they were looking for — world changers coming up,” Tagliaferri said.

The eagle is still at the wildlife center and doing well. Charlie said that his grandmother receives regular updates on its condition which she then passes on to Charlie.

“The latest update I have gotten is that it’s perching high in the trees, when people come in it flies away. That’s good,” Charlie said.

“They’re trying not to feed it with (their) hands. ‘Cause, you know, if they tried to feed it with their hands, it would never know how to feed itself,” Reagan interjected

“Yep. They want it to be on its own to be able to hunt,” Charlie said.