With two siblings fledged and flying the skies, there’s just one left to go! Explore.org fan and Osprey Cam viewer, Sabine, wrote this Ode to Pia for encouragement!
Little Mia Pia, sitting on the ledge,
Waiting for the time just right to fledge,
And keeping her viewers
(Among which no boo-ers)
All hopping and popping and much on edge.
Pia, the last of the Osprey siblings, looks over the nest edge in Hog Island, ME
In this snapshot, Pia takes a wary look back over the the edge. Watch the Osprey Cam now – we expect Pia to fledge at any moment if all that wing flapping is any indicator!
Below we have a new update from our partners at the Audubon Society regarding bird identification and gender:
Hi osprey fans! Some viewers asked “does a chick with a distinct ‘necklace’ suggest that this is a female?” We turned your question over to osprey expert Dr. Rob Bierregaard who helped band the chicks. He responded:
“We judged the sex of the osprey chicks based on the thickness of their legs ( tarsi). The first and third birds banded were probably females. I’m not sure the breast coloration works well for juveniles, but suspect the ones with really dark chests are females, but wouldn’t bet the farm on that for sexing young. Hatching sequence will confuse the issue a bit as the young are growing, but by the time they’re about 5 weeks old, they are pretty much full grown in terms of body size and most growth from then on is in the feathers.”
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