Banding osprey nestlings with red auxiliary bands at a nest off LBI. photo by Northside Jim.
If you live along or visit the coast, then it’s no surprise that ospreys continue to thrive in New Jersey. 2018 was yet another banner year for these coastal nesting raptors. Their large stick nests depict our rivers and estuaries while they indicate that we’re doing a good job of protecting our local environment along the coast. Today we’ve published results from last year’s nesting season in the 2018 New Jersey Osprey Project Report.
On a brisk November morning, a couple dedicated NJ Osprey Project volunteers joined myself and CWF Biologist Larissa Smith to install an osprey platform on the coastal saltmarsh of New Jersey. The new platform was installed to replace a very old and unstable platform that fell this summer. The new structure is more than twice the size of the old one and will give the nesting pair, who return in the spring, a much more resilient nest site. As you can see from the video above, it takes a bit of strength to raise up a 16′ tall wood nest platform. We decided to slow it down when WCC Volunteer, Wayne R. gives it a final push. Continue reading “Video from the Field: Osprey Platform Install”
The threats are real and these photos should alarm you!
by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
U.S. Coast Guard assists NJ Fish & Wildlife with recovering an entangled osprey on a channel marker in Cape May Harbor, Summer 2018. photo by Kathy Clark/ENSP
Photos courtesy of Chanta L Jackson, Asbury Park School District Communications Director unless otherwise noted.
It is only week two of the Conserve Wildlife Foundation (CWF) Summer Learning Experience program, a part of the Asbury Park School District Summer Camp offerings, and third-grade students have had the opportunity to not only see an osprey up close and personal but to visit a local nest and learn to simulate building the predatory bird’s nesting place.
Thanks to dedicated Conserve Wildlife Foundation of NJ staff and volunteers three osprey chicks were saved from what could have been an unhappy fate.
NJ Osprey Project Volunteers Matt Tribulski, Wayne Russell and John King were surveying osprey nests in the Wildwood back bay area this past weekend. They checked on a nest with three chicks and found that the platform top was broken and a strong possibility it could collapse, especially with any heavy rains or winds. The chicks weren’t old enough to fly and would have fallen to the marsh and died. Continue reading “Osprey Chicks Get A Necessary “Home” Upgrade”
An osprey with a balloon ribbon around its leg at Island Beach State Park. Volunteers from the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey removed the ribbon and cleaned the osprey’s nest on Tuesday afternoon. Photo by Jeff Goldman, NJ.com
Two volunteer groups and the Seaside Heights public works department teamed to help a baby osprey that had a balloon ribbon tangled around its leg in a nest at Island Beach State Park.
The Amazing History of a Breeding Adult Male Osprey at Island Beach State Park
by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
Bandit in flight while carrying nesting material. He has been nesting at the Pete McLain Osprey Cam nest since 2013. photo by Karl Soehnlein.
Around 3% of ospreys who were banded with USGS aluminum bird bands as nestlings in New Jersey are re-sighted after fledging or leaving their nest. Most of those recoveries or resightings are centered around mortality based events where a bird is injured or killed and the band is then close enough to read. Since the numbers on the leg bands are so small, it is often hard to read when they are still alive. However, when enough photos are obtained or a camera is installed on a nest then the likelihood of reading the band on a live bird increases. Continue reading “Identifying “Bandit” at Pete McLain Osprey Cam Nest”
Barnegat Bay Osprey Returns to New Jersey After Two Year Vacation
by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
04/D was photographed in Allendale at the Celery Farm by Barbara Dilger on Monday, April 23.
North American ospreys migrate long distances to and from their breeding and wintering grounds in the southern U.S., Central America, Caribbean Islands, and N. South America. For the past four years we have been banding young ospreys who originate from nests on Barnegat Bay with an auxiliary band to help determine their movements after fledging. Project RedBand was designed to help track the migration, dispersal, life span, and foraging habits of ospreys from Barnegat Bay, a unique estuary along the Atlantic Coast of New Jersey. The project was also designed to help engage the public in osprey management and conservation. Since the red bands are highly visible and readable with optics, it allows the public the ability to identify the individual and then learn about their past. Lastly, we now rely heavily on citizen scientists who report nesting activity on Osprey Watch. Continue reading “Osprey 04/D Back in Jersey!”
