Jordan Lake. While cruising with Captain Doug, from far off we could see a huge fish under the talons of an osprey fledgling. She was quite proud of the fish. Captain Doug got us around to where we could see the Osprey’s front. The fish’s head is missing. Most likely one of the parents caught the fish, removed the head and then gave the carcass to her daughter.
Jordan Lake. Hooray! The Hard Luck Osprey couple managed to raise a chick this year. Last year they didn’t raise any babies at all because of their hard luck with marauding bald eagles and a fallen nest tree. This morning I got to watch their new fledgling trying to learn how to fish.
Jordan Lake: The fledgling osprey had worked hard most of the morning trying to catch a fish. The bald eagle had been watching. The osprey got her fish and the eagle wanted it. The chase was on…
Jordan Lake: this female Fledgling Osprey jumped from her perch high in a tree on one side of the cove. She was dashing straight across to the other side. Then abruptly the youngster threw on her air brakes, wrapped her wings around herself and looked over her shoulder, hard, down to the lake below. There the dancer hung for a long heartbeat. Then the osprey shrugged as if well nothing there after all and she turned her head back forward. Unwrapped her feathered wings cape and finished her flight to the other side. A true sky ballerina.
Jordan Lake: Osprey Moon. The moon was setting. This fledgling female osprey had been trying hard to catch a fish. I managed to catch her as she made a transit of the moon.
Jordan Lake: In flight, the white marks at the end of each flight feather of a fledgling osprey look like dots (I call them “rivets” as at a distance they look metallic to me). This female fledgling gave me a very close fly-by. You can easily see that the white is actually an edging of the color at the feather tips. These “dots” wear off over the next 12-18 months and so by the time this osprey would return to Jordan Lake in about 2 years, she will have lost her rivets.
doc ellen's journey 