Sorry to keep going on about this, but it’s worth mentioning.
There was a dead osprey in our yard this afternoon. We’d been gone and when we returned it appeared that the osprey had been there for a while. It looked like an adult, big, with well developed talons and beak, tail feathers and wings. But its body mass was nearly gone.
How did this happen? There was no sign of trauma that I could see, though it was far too late for a necropsy. Trying to imagine the causes of death I thought of poison, a natural illness, a shooting, and little else. These birds are so powerful and self sufficient there seems little else that coud kill them.
The heat was too great to dig a hole for burial, so we bagged it (the bird) and carried it to a disposal area. Which osprey it was, whether it left young or a mate, I do not know. But I learned this. I now know why the parents of our young one in the water (see earlier post) could not save it. The talons are fearsome. Long, curved and sharp as needles. I certainly would not wish to be saved in a set of those.
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