A reboot of EagleCam, a wildly popular window into the breeding lives of Minnesota bald eagles, is set to go live Thursday.

The new camera will live stream from a nest in the metro of a pair of bald eagles that have successfully bred and used the nest for at least four years. The Department of Natural Resources announced the news Tuesday.

"We can't wait to see the story of the new pair of eagles on the new EagleCam unfold," Lori Naumann told the Minnesota Star Tribune. Naumann has managed the EagleCam program for the Nongame Wildlife Program since the camera first went online in 2013.

Loyal EagleCam followers online anticipated the news with excitement. Friends of Minnesota Nongame Eagle Cam, a Facebook group, has more than 16,000 members, while the feed is known to draw hundreds of thousands viewers around the United States and internationally. The previous EagleCam, which followed the lives of an eagle pair dubbed Beau and Nancy, met disaster on April 2, 2023, when the massive nest collapsed.

The 20-year-old nest was laden with snow and ice weighing an estimated 2,000 pounds before it broke from its rotting branch. The fall killed a single remaining eaglet and scattered the parents.

The camera perched above it, however, remained intact. The video feed was turned on periodically and captured the return of the two birds. The pair have flown around the territory, much to the delight of their Facebook followers, and produced young at another nest last winter. Electricity couldn't be installed near the birds' new location, the DNR said in a news release.

Photo: Courtesy of Minnesota Nongame Wildlife Program
A female bald eagle protects her eggs through a blizzard in February 2023. The image went viral.

Naumann is confident in the new location for several reasons. The nest is smaller and newer, and its tree is young and healthier. "We have a lot of faith in [the tree]," she said.

The new nest is on public land about 2 miles from the old site, but Naumann said it is a secure area that the public can't access.

The raptor pair at the new site had three chicks last winter. The raptors also fostered two other chicks placed toward the bottom of the nest tree with the hope they would bond. All five eaglets fledged last summer, she said. Bald eagles begin preparing nests in mid-to-late November. Breeding behavior can begin in January, with eggs possible in February. The birds produce a clutch of up to four eggs.

Viewership of the camera's feed likely peaked in February 2023, a few months before the collapse, with the scene of one of the parents dutifully atop the eggs, up to its neck in snow during a blizzard. The Nongame Wildlife Program estimated 1.9 million people saw the viral image.

The new camera stream goes live at 6 a.m. Thursday at mn.dnr/eaglecam. The stream also will appear on the DNR's YouTube channel at bit.ly/mneaglecamera. The original camera feed also will go live Thursday, showing the territory around the collapsed nest where the eagle pair has occasionally been spotted.

The new EagleCam experience is different, Naumann said. The camera and microphone are positioned closer to the nest this time. Viewers might now be able to hear peeps when chicks arrive.

"That would be the cherry on top," she said.