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While taking a walk we met a man who asked if we had seen any good wildlife on the walk; we hadn't. He had, and told us where we could see Osprey ... lots of Osprey, diving for fish. So the next day we went and saw this amazing sight. To try to share some of the amazement, we have a couple of slideshows that are series of pictures showing some of the action.
Osprey are all wings and talons!
Here is an osprey catching a fish; if you put your cursor over the slideshow it will pause on the current picture:
An Osprey in flight, carrying a fish:
Here is a different slideshow of an Osprey div & catch:
Every dive we saw was successful. The Osprey would hover and identify a fish before making their dive. As we stood there, Anne said in amazement to Paul "That Osprey has 2 fish!" Paul gave her that expected you-are-crazy look. Except when we got back, a picure proved that yes, that Osprey had 2 fish in its talons. This next picture is not for the squeamish; you might want to scroll down quickly to the picture after that if you are. And yes, those are drops of blood falling from the fish.
All this diving is wet business!
A couple more images of Osprey before we move on:
We saw Osprey in other locations as well, just not as densely populated. Here is a picture of Ram Island Lighthouse, and the small island in front of it that has an Osprey nest. At the right of this next picture is the next, and there is an Osprey showing both in the next (on the edge of it) and just above the trees, flying in.
As amazing as the Osprey were, there were other bird sightings and activities that were interesting. At the same location where we saw all the Osprey, there were also many Cormorants.
We love this picture of a gull looking under the water.
Here is another slideshow, and this is the story behind it: We saw an Eider (sorry, no picture of it) dive under the water surface to catch a meal. While it was under, a Herring Gull swooped in, went into the water, and took the crab away from the Eider. As it triumphantly flew away, a second gull came in and attempted to get the crab; the 2nd gull was not successful.
Remember the poor Eider that had its meal stolen by the gull? Here you can get a look at an Eider line-up.
There were also cute little songbirds. This 1st one is a Northern Parula Warbler.
This is a Swamp Sparrow, which we IDd with the help of our friend Rod:
And a female Hairy Woodpecker.
On to page 4: Homeward bound
Updated July 2020