June 10, 2005
Welcome New Chick
Late this afternoon, we were rewarded with the appearance of the first visible chick of our Osprey Cam 2005 season!
Over the last day or so, we had seen the father osprey hanging around the nest quite a bit and the mother checking the eggs on and off. This afternoon, it suddenly appeared that one of the eggs had something beside it and it looked like that "something" was moving.
Not long after, we saw a little head pop up. And now we can see the broken shell being moved around the nest. Welcome little chick!
We hope he is healthy and starts to gain his strength. Saturday and Sunday are the likely hatching days for the third egg, so we might be treated to more action soon.
Since we now know that at least one of the eggs was fertile, it seems more likely that the first egg did hatch back on June 5, but the chick did not survive very long, and the eggshell and chick were quickly removed by the parents or buried under nesting material.
We'll try to update the Gallery over the weekend to show all the activity leading up to the hatching.
