Comeback Species✓✓ 2 independent sources
Bald eagles: 417 pairs to 316,700 birds in the lower 48
417 → 71,400 nesting pairs (1963–2019)
DDT-thinned eggshells had pushed America's national bird toward extinction; the 1972 U.S. DDT ban and Endangered Species Act protections (the eagle was delisted in 2007) reversed the crash. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's latest survey counts about 316,700 bald eagles and 71,400 nesting pairs in the conterminous United States, and peer-reviewed modeling now manages sustainable take for the growing population.
Just 417 bald eagle nesting pairs remained in the lower 48 states in 1963. After the 1972 DDT ban: an estimated 71,400 nesting pairs — roughly 316,700 individual eagles.