My husband and son went camping this weekend at Woods Lake, but I didn’t get to go. When they got back, they had a cool story.
My son took this photograph of the lake. As you can probably tell, they were in a boat .
Shortly afterward, his dad took this photograph:
Probably can’t see them, but there are two dots over the tops of the trees, right above the white hat.
Let’s crop the photo:
They tell me those are an osprey and an eagle. The guys were in a boat watching an osprey catch fish. The osprey had one successful catch and was trying again when a bald eagle came barreling in and chased the osprey. Guess it was quite a sight.
Bald eagles are known to chase and mob ospreys. Usually they seem to be after the fish the osprey caught. The eagle swoops at an osprey that has just caught a fish, and often the osprey drops its meal. Guess who gets the meal instead.
Eagles have also been filmed preying on osprey chicks in their nest.
Although an osprey looks like a big bird when it is by itself, a bald eagle is much bigger and heavier.
Here’s a quick video that discusses how to tell the two birds apart.
Have you ever seen an osprey? How about a bald eagle? Have you ever seen the two interact?
