August 20, 2005
Mother Gone?
Contest: First, we want to thank everyone again for participating in our Chick-Naming Contest this season. In case anyone missed our announcement, you can see the contest results here. And again, congratulations to Bonnie Kelley for being the winner!
Nest Update: We're hoping that the recharged battery has fixed our equipment problem. We weren't sure why the battery ran down on Friday, so we were a little worried that the solar panel we moved over from the eagle nest was failing us. So far so good though, so maybe it was just the battery.
Over the last couple days our Osprey Cam has suddenly morphed into the Attack of the Giant Spider! Cam. Of course, the spider is probably tiny, but on the web cam it looks huge. Initially the spider was only seen at night, but for some reason it's now making daylight appearances. On a personal note, spiders are the only creatures in the world that give me the willies, so the sooner a marsh bird flies by and eats it, the better I will feel. :-)
As for the ospreys, right now we're trying to determine if the mother osprey has migrated. If I was a betting person, I would bet that she has. Excluding our downtime on Friday, we have not definitely seen the mother osprey since late Thursday afternoon. She was not on the nest Thursday night for the first time since she laid the initial egg back in April. In addition, we didn't have definite sightings of her on Friday morning or Saturday. Also, our cam technician did not see her when he was beneath the nest replacing the battery. Naturally that makes us think that the mother osprey may have migrated.
On Wednesday and Thursday, before she disappeared, the chicks were away quite a bit. During the day on Wednesday, the chicks were missing for a few hours before the mother and father showed up, each carrying a fish for the family -- but there was no family to be seen. The mother osprey likely assumed that when she arrived with food, the chicks would come flying, but they did not. Dad didn't wait long and started eating his meal, but mom took off with her fish, presumably in search of the missing chicks.
Once dad had his fill, he left too, and then the nest was empty again. Not long after, a turkey vulture showed up and began to scavenge the remaining fish bits left in the nest. The vulture did not stay long, as it probably heard the male osprey calling for it to vacate the nest, which it quickly did. Finally the two chicks showed up a little while later.
It's possible that due to the chicks' extended absences on Wednesday and Thursday that the mother osprey interpreted this as a sign that she could leave. On Saturday morning, we did see what looked like the father osprey quickly drop off a fish for the chicks and then fly off. This was in line with his previous behavior of not hanging around to feed the chicks himself.
Then later Saturday, we saw another adult, sporting a light necklace, land and stay for only a minute. At first I thought it might be the mother because of the faint brown coloring on her chest, but then Lightning -- the youngest chick -- took a very submissive posture at the sight of the adult, and I had doubts it was the mother. The adult only stayed for a moment, then left and didn't return. These were among the most promising adult sightings we've had in the last few days.
Some other interesting developments: On the nest Saturday, we did see one of the chicks apparently defending the nest from a visiting osprey chick. Our chick took a defensive stance right before a fledgling landed on the nest; then it seemed to drive off the visiting chick. We know one of our chicks would not have acted this way toward its sibling, so we have to assume the bird was a visiting fledgling from another local nest.
We've also seen both Thunder and Lightning calling out and showing a defensive stance to objects we cannot see. We assume some of these displays are directed at bald eagles that have likely noticed that the osprey parents are not around. Our osprey chicks from last year also had to defend the nest against the eagles when the parents were absent, so this is normal behavior.
We'll keep looking for the mother osprey, but right now it looks like she is gone. At least we know that the father is still in town and is bringing the occasional fish. Now we just need Thunder to learn how to share some of its food, or we need Lightning to get more aggressive in demanding a piece of the meal.
Until next time,
Lisa - webmaster