For the second year in a row there haven’t been eagles nesting on the Three Bridges platform in view of eagle cam. The pair used the platform when it was first installed in 2021 and viewers got to watch the two chicks grow up and fledge. In 2022 & 2023 the pair have nested in a tree nest instead of the platform. While it’s disappointing that the pair didn’t use the platform, there was still plenty of avian action at the tower this season. There were several immature eagles visiting the platform this season, perhaps in the next few years one of these eagles will pair up and use the platform.
Slideshow: Highlights from the 2023 Three Bridges Eagle cam season
December 4th, 2022, photo by: Mary Ellen Hill
December 9, 2022; photo by, Barb McKee
eagle pair chase off Red- tailed hawk
American Kestrels
Peregrine Falcon
Red-tailed hawk
Northern Flicker
The eagle cam will be turned off April 1st.
Thank you to all the viewers who watch and enjoy this eagle cam. During the 2023 season there were 22,981 views of the cam. Thank you to the the eagle project volunteers, especially Mary Ellen Hill, who grab screenshots from the cam. We also thank PSE&G for hosting and supporting the eagle camera.
The Duke Farms eagle cam is extremely popular and just this week viewers watched as two chicks hatched. These two chicks will be watched by a multitude of viewers over the next few months as they grow to become juveniles and leave the nest. As with anything in Nature, this pair has had it’s ups and downs. I wanted to summarize the history of this pair and nest. The male is a NJ banded bird (A/59) and has been in the pair from the beginning, he is 23 years old. Interestingly, there have been several females in the pair over the years. Thank you to Duke Farms for hosting the cam and their tech team that keeps it running smoothly when issues arise. The cam location has changed as well as the cam itself over the years and the quality of the picture has improved.
We’re proud to release results of the 2022 New Jersey Osprey Project Survey, which documented the greatest number of nesting ospreys in the history of the project. Overall, surveys by staff and loyal volunteers recorded a total of 733 occupied nests throughout the state. The majority of ospreys (83%) continue to nest along the Atlantic coast of New Jersey with the remainder nesting along the Delaware Bay and inland locations. Surveys recorded the outcome of 73% of the known population, which allows us to present these results with confidence.
Osprey 98/K with prey over Barnegat Lighthouse State Park. May 2022. Photo by Bob Peal.
I have been finalizing osprey band re-sightings and encounters from last year and one particular band number stood out. It was 98/K, who was re-sighted by Bob Peal during his visit to Barnegat Lighthouse State Park on May 17, 2022. There he photographed a variety of wildlife, including several ospreys who had red auxiliary bands, one of which was readable!
Osprey 52/K. September 5, 2022. Photo by Chris Kelly.
In 2014, we began to band osprey nestlings produced at nests within the Barnegat Bay watershed with auxiliary bands. This was an effort which came about from the interest of Jim Verhagen, a LBI resident and wildlife biographer. He wondered why young ospreys were not banded with color, field readable bands, like some endangered raptors, including bald eagles and peregrine falcons. This spawned Project RedBand, an osprey banding and re-sighting project. The goal of the project was to learn more about ospreys when they are alive while engaging coastal residents in their management. Just under 500 young ospreys were banded with red auxiliary bands from 2014-2020 from nests all along the Barnegat Bay estuary.
