Osprey Update: July 3, 5:30p.m.

Time of death: July 3, 5:30p.m.

I am sad to report that a second osprey nestling at the power company has died. I was monitoring the platform for a couple of hours - hoping to snap a good week 6 phot. The more I watched the more I noticed that the smaller nestling was not doing well. In the time I was watching that bird never took food; it seemed weak and unsteady, it flopped down a couple times, it had a couple of bouts of what looked like seizures tossing its head back and forth. At close to 5:30 it flopped down on its side (usually they sleep/rest on their front side) gave one big stretch of its wing, pulled its wing in and stopped moving with its head tucked and bent into the right side, and its legs stretched out to the left. That moment was exactly 5:30p.m.

I do not know the cause of death. It had clearly been getting weaker; the bigger nestling seemed to prevent feeding at times; and, for the last day or so it seems to have shown little interest or strength for getting up to be fed. And, I suspect the heat of the day did not help the nestling to thrive.