Do male bald eagles lay on the eggs?

Ma and Pa eagle build a large nest consisting of a structural understory of twigs and limbs. The nest is usually high up in a tree, sometimes on a cliff, or even on the ground, but generally the higher the better. The nest has a bowl-like depression in the center. The parents fill the depression with grass and straw to make a level surface, and in the middle of that they excavate a smaller cup.

Bald eagles re-use their nests season after season, and when one of a pair dies, the other will take on a new mate from among the unmated younger eagles. Some very large nests are believed to have been occupied for hundreds of years continuously.

The female settles on the cup and lays her egg into it. You can see this happen on various webcams that have been installed at bald eagle nests; if you are lucky enough to actually witness egg laying, all you will see is that the female gives a little shrugging wiggle.

Once the first egg is laid, it's incubated continuously until it hatches, with Ma and Pa taking turns. If more than one egg is laid in a season, the second and (very rarely) third eggs are laid in the same cup at intervals of about three days. The parents guard the eggs at all times, and take care to turn the eggs with their beaks from time to time.

The eggs hatch about 35-40 days after they are laid, and they hatch in the same order, with a few days delay between each one.