All those Yellowstone entries were a good learning experience but.....the birds are back presenting their wedding colours AND behaviours .... it is time to get OUT of the house and LIVE in Nature.
The sure sign of spring around here is the return of Osprey, Pandion haliaetus, also known as the fishing eagle.
The Kootenays are blessed with water - a lot of it - therefore these fish-eating birds love to return here after spending their winters in Meso and South Americas.
I hope to write more about them soon, today it is only a short sequence that I would like to share.
Osprey return to their nest year after year; this one is an an old railway bridge by Columbia River.
As it is usual with the birds of prey, the female is larger, in this case it is the one sitting on the nest. She keeps on looking up and soon I see a tiny speck in the sky - another osprey is descending to the nest. Her mate!
He clutches something dark and red in one of his talons.
A fish.
He lands and they start "talking" in a series of gentle, hardly audible sounds; then something strange happens:
Are they kissing?!? Surely not!
I am too far away but it looks like they are sharing small nibbles of the fish. They are not hungry for food!
This is taking a while - a couple of minutes at least. Then he gets up, ready to leave.
I thought that they finished the meal and he is going to get some more. But wait!
What is it, that he is holding in his talon? The fish?????
Was this only a teaser?
Or a showoff : "Look, I can do this any time I fly! I'll be a great Dad to the chicks!"?
Did she not like the fish?
Why did he bring only a half?
And why is he taking it back? The red that we cannot see in the photo indicates the same fish that he brought in.
Too many human questions.... shouldn't snoop into private lives like this!
Soon he circles high above. She gives me an inquiring look, then takes off as well.
Good luck lovers! Maybe it was the Osprey Valentine's.
As it is usual with the birds of prey, the female is larger, in this case it is the one sitting on the nest. She keeps on looking up and soon I see a tiny speck in the sky - another osprey is descending to the nest. Her mate! He clutches something dark and red in one of his talons.
A fish.
He lands and they start "talking" in a series of gentle, hardly audible sounds; then something strange happens:
Are they kissing?!? Surely not!
I am too far away but it looks like they are sharing small nibbles of the fish. They are not hungry for food!
This is taking a while - a couple of minutes at least. Then he gets up, ready to leave. I thought that they finished the meal and he is going to get some more. But wait!
What is it, that he is holding in his talon? The fish?????
Was this only a teaser?
Or a showoff : "Look, I can do this any time I fly! I'll be a great Dad to the chicks!"?
Did she not like the fish?
Why did he bring only a half?
And why is he taking it back? The red that we cannot see in the photo indicates the same fish that he brought in.
Too many human questions.... shouldn't snoop into private lives like this!
Soon he circles high above. She gives me an inquiring look, then takes off as well.
Good luck lovers! Maybe it was the Osprey Valentine's.
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