Results from 2019 Osprey Nest Surveys highlight another productive year.
by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
An osprey nest in a snag on Barnegat Bay. July 2019.
Surveys of osprey nests in New Jersey have occurred annually for the past forty five years. They are conducted to help determine the overall size and health of the population. The first aerial survey over Barnegat Bay counted only five active nests. Ten years earlier there had been over 50. The combined effects of DDT and habitat loss had taken their toll. No osprey nests were productive and the population at risk of being extirpated from the state.
“In 1974 there were only five active osprey nests on Barnegat Bay. Today there are approximately one hundred and fifty.”
After ospreys were listed as endangered an innovative effort to transplant viable eggs from the Chesapeake Bay to Barnegat Bay began. In addition, to help replace natural nest sites that were lost to development, man-made nest platforms were designed and installed away from human disturbance. Slowly osprey pairs became productive thanks to the die hard effort of State biologists like Pete McLain, Kathy Clark and many volunteers and partners. It’s encouraging for us to look back to see how far we’ve come in the statewide recovery of ospreys in New Jersey.
by Marissa Murdock, 2019 NJ Osprey Project Intern; Rider University ’21
Marissa holds osprey 83/K who was banded after pre-maturely fledging and landing on the ground.
This past summer I was lucky enough to work with Conserve Wildlife Foundation as a volunteer student intern. I worked alongside Ben Wurst, CWF’s Habitat Program Manager, helping with the New Jersey Osprey Project. My internship consisted of assisting with osprey surveys, banding young, and recording data so that we can estimate the health of the population in New Jersey.
May 25th, 2019. Duke getting fitted with transmitter
A transmitter was placed on a chick from the Duke Farms Eagle Cam nest for the first time this year. This nest cam has been watched by thousands of people over the years and now cam watchers will be able to follow the movements of “Duke” after fledging.
On the last osprey survey of the season we stumbled upon a new nest — one that was built on an abandoned crab pot. We were drifting on Absecon Bay when summarizing data when we heard an adult making defensive calls at a nest. We looked and saw a low nest on the ground.Continue reading “Photos from the Field: Ospreys Nest on Abandoned Crab Pot”
A new report finds that a record number of ospreys were observed in New Jersey during the year 2018. The report was prepared by the state Division of Fish and Wildlife and The Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey.
Report co-author Benjamin Wurst, of The Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey, says 932 ospreys were spotted along New Jersey’s coast last year. Wurst says part of the increase has to do with less pollution.
“We are just not seeing the prevalence of these pollutants, in the form where it would actually hurt them,” Wurst said.
Support New Jersey’s ospreys with donations matching a $12,500 challenge to help Conserve Wildlife Foundation purchase a boat.
by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
Surveying a nest on Long Beach Island in 2017, the last year we were able to utilize a state owned boat. photo by Northside Jim.
Ospreys are living barometers. They symbolize the resilience of life along the New Jersey coast. As a top tier predator who feeds exclusively on fish, their collective health is a direct link to the health of our coastal waters. Anyone can tell you that a healthy coast is essential to life at the shore. Clean water with abundant and healthy wildlife equals a booming shore economy. We have all benefited from actions and policy that have protected our air, land and water since the 1970s. Ospreys are no exception.
The male at the Duke Farms nest is banded with a green NJ band, A/59. He is nineteen years old this season.
D/59 and female: Feb. 4, 2019@Kathy Clark
On March 24, 2000, at 2 weeks of age, A/59 was fostered from the Greenwich nest in Cumberland County to the Rancocas nest in Burlington County. On May 15, 2000 he was banded, a backpack transmitter attached and fledged on June 3. ENSP’s staff tracked A/59 until the transmitter’s signal was last recorded on October 22. You can read more details in the 2000 Bald Eagle Report. A/59 started nesting at the Duke Farms nest in 2006 and has been in the public eye ever since on the Duke Farms eagle cam.
“Tiny” C/94: Update
We have an interesting update on one of A/59’s offspring, “Tiny” C/94, who has been nesting in CT since 2014. “Tiny’s” original mate was a Massachusetts banded female. In 2017 nest monitor Cyndi Pratt Didan, reported that he had a new mate with a green NJ band on her right leg. Cyndi was recently able to get a photo of the females band and we could read the code as D/15.
D/15 in CT @Cyndi Pratt Didan
In 2010, D/15 was one of two female chicks banded at the Duke Farms nest. Yes, she is Tiny’s sibling. Tiny was banded in 2009. It is interesting that two eagles from the same nest in NJ ended up as a pair nesting in CT and that we are able to know this information via bands and the Duke Farms cam. Cyndi has not yet found where the pair is nesting but will keep us updated.
Mercer
County is now home to two pairs of bald eagles and their nests. The discovery
comes nearly three decades after the species nearly vanished from New Jersey.
“Bald eagles in particular were wiped out to
where we only had one nest in all of New Jersey as recently as the 1980s, and
it wasn’t even a successful nest. And now we have over 200 pairs of bald
eagles,” said David Wheeler, executive director of the Conserve Wildlife
Foundation of New Jersey.
Wheeler said pesticides and people led to the
near extinction of bald eagles.
Friday, bird watchers came
equipped with binoculars and cameras to catch a glimpse of one the nests
located at Mercer County Park.
“To
see the nature and the national symbol of the United States all right here
in Mercer Park is pretty neat,” said Flemington resident Graham
MacRitchie.
Nearly 70 people were part of a new educational
walking tour run by the County Parks Commission.
