It's not a hawk, it's not an eagle --

It's an osprey, and although it looks like a small bald eagle, it is not really closely related to them.  In fact, there is only one species of osprey, distributed world-wide, and it is so different from hawks, falcons, eagles, and owls, that it is classified in its own family.



It's becoming more common to find ospreys nesting in parks, and this pair took up residence in a ball/soccer park in Maple Grove.  Similarly, an osprey nest at the Roseville ballfields made the local newspaper because the birds were so cooperative in posing for photographers. The lights make a perfect nesting platform, once a few sticks have been added.  The female lays two to four eggs and incubates them for 40 days (a long boring stretch of sitting in the hot sun).  The number of young raised depends on how many fish the parents can catch.





Males take care of most of the feeding and make frequent deliveries of fish to the chicks for about 6 to 8 weeks.  Osprey chicks are especially vulnerable to predation from Great Horned Owls and Racoons, so the female usually stays close to the nestlings.



Sometimes, it only takes one foot to grab and immobilize the fish, like this bird is doing here.



Osprey have remarkable feet, as well as wonderful eyesight, to help them catch fish feeding near the lake surface.  Like owls they can rotate their outer toe backward to oppose the other two, giving them a two prong pincer to immobilize their prey.  In addition, they have rough, barbed scales on the bottoms of their feet that help grip and stabilize that wriggling, squirmy, slimy fish.



Six weeks after hatching, young osprey like this little guy above, look like miniatures of their parents, but are not yet ready to catch fish on their own.  They might leave the nest and undertake short flapping flights to the nearest tree, but are still probably fed largely by the adults.





Seeing free-flying birds like this in a semi-urban area is a thrill.  Like the Bald Eagle, osprey almost disappeared from North America in the 1960s due to contamination of the water and their fish prey with DDT and related pesticides as well as PCBs used in plastics manufacture.  Vigorous reintroduction programs begun in the 80s and 90s (in MN) helped re-establish breeding pairs in the state.  Since osprey mate for life and offspring return to the area where they were raised, the Minnesota osprey population seems to be a healthy one again.