A bald eagle named Beauty had its beak shot off several years ago, leaving her with a stump that is useless for hunting food. So a team of volunteers worked to attach an artificial beak to the wounded bird and help save her life.

She could not survive in the wild without human intervention,” Jane Fink Cantwell said.

The 15-pound eagle was found in 2005 scrounging for food and slowly starving to death at a landfill in Alaska. Most of her curved upper beak had been shot away, leaving her tongue and sinuses exposed. She could not clutch or tear at food.Beauty was taken to a bird recovery center in Anchorage, where she was hand-fed for two years while her caretakers waited in vain for a new beak to grow.

“They had exhausted their resources and she would likely be euthanized,” Cantwell said.

Beauty was taken in 2007 to Cantwell’s Birds of Prey Northwest ranch in Idaho after permits were obtained from the federal government.Soon after, Cantwell met Nate Calvin during a speaking engagement in Boise. Calvin, a mechanical engineer, offered to design an artificial beak. A dentist, veterinarian and other experts eventually volunteered to help.Molds were made of the existing beak parts and scanned into a computer, so the bionic beak could be created as accurately as possible.

“One side has much greater damage than the other,” Cantwell said. “It’s not as simple as a quick, snapped-off beak, 90 degrees and flush.”

The nylon-composite beak is light and durable, and will be glued onto the eagle. [Yahoo News]

to help heal birds and visit birdsofpreynorthwest.org. Birds of Prey Northwest promotes stewardship and conservation of raptors through educational programs with live birds of prey. They provide medical treatment and rehabilitation to injured birds of prey with the ultimate goal of returning them to the wild.