Osprey
Pandion haliaetus
44.4895, -68.857
Field Notes
Description:
L 23" WS 5'6"
Adult brown above with white crown and dark line through eye, white below. Imm. has buffy crown, pale feather edges on wings and back. Feet gray; eyes yellow. Flies with wings bent at "wrist" like flattened M; flight feathers, tail finely baned. Hovers; often flies grasping fish in talons. Nest is mass of sticks topping dead tree or platform on osprey pole (or in this case, part of an old wharf). Devastated by DDT, it has rebounded since the pesticide was banned.
Voice: Kee-uk and Cheep
Habitat:
Coastal estuaries, rivers, lakes
Range: April- November; all coastal New England & northern lakes.
Notes:
The female has a blue band on one leg and a white one on another. Two babies! The male made a short appearance, but left to chase some cormorants that were flying too close and then off to hunt. He'd have gotten the cormorant except the bird dived just before the osprey could get at him.
SOURCE: Nat'l Audubon Society: Field Guide to New England (Peter Alden & Brian Cassie)
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