by Ben Wurst / Senior Wildlife Biologist
Last fall I received a text from Kelly Scott, Resource Interpretive Specialist at Island Beach State Park about an osprey platform. She was kayaking within the Sedge Island Marine Conservation Zone and noticed one laying on its side – on a sandbar. I knew exactly which nest she was looking at. Later last year, I flew my sUAS to confirm her observation and make plans to get it back in working order before ospreys returned this year.
(more…)by Sherry Tirgrath, Wildlife Biologist
Three young osprey chicks found themselves without their parents after a utility pole nest caught fire at the National Guard Training Center (NGTC) in Sea Girt, NJ. Osprey often choose utility poles as nesting structures because of the 360° view they offer. Fires caused by the nests, composed mostly of dried sticks and seagrass, aren’t uncommon. Because of the safety hazard imposed by the nest, it was removed from the utility pole at the NGTC with three healthy chicks inside. The chicks were approximately a week to ten days old when removed from the nest and were brought temporarily to The Raptor Trust in Millington by Charles Appleby, Chief of the Environmental Bureau of the NJ Department of Military and Veterans Affairs (NJDMAVA) to be cared for while a new nesting platform could be built. Reuniting the chicks with their parents in a safe nest box would give them their best chance at survival.
by Ben Wurst / Habitat Program Manager
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.
(more…)by Ben Wurst, Habitat Program Manager
After migratory birds depart, leaves fall and northwest winds prevail, a small group of dedicated volunteers descend on our coastal saltmarshes. They’re there to maintain osprey nest platforms. Around 75% of our nesting ospreys rely on these wooden structures to reproduce. They were used to help jumpstart the early recovery efforts of ospreys in coastal New Jersey, where much of their native habitat was lost to development in the 1950-60s. Today many of these platforms are reaching their life span or are very close.
(more…)by Ethan Gilardi
CWF Biologist Todd Pover and the Barnegat Light Habitat Restoration Project are back in the news with a wonderful write-up by Juliet Kaszas-Hoch on TheSandpaper.net.
With major construction wrapping in late-2019, we’re now seeing the project’s positive impact on the local piping plover population. Only time will tell just how successful the restoration truly is, but until then we will continue to chart it’s progress and do what we can to make life better for New Jersey’s beach nesters.
Read an except of article here and remember to check out the video update on the project linked below!
With fall on its way, most piping plovers and other migratory coastal birds have headed south, where they will remain for the duration of the winter months. While they’re gone, other species will happily utilize the new pond feature and habitat site along the inlet in Barnegat Lighthouse State Park created specifically to benefit beach-nesting birds such as plovers.
The Barnegat Light Habitat Restoration Project is a collaborative effort led by Todd Pover, Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey senior wildlife biologist, and Brooke Maslo, Rutgers University assistant professor of ecology, in partnership with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the N.J. Division of Fish and Wildlife.
As Pover explained in a recent blog post on conservewildlifenj.org, the goal of the project, begun two years ago, was to enhance breeding habitat near Long Beach Island’s north-end inlet “by clearing out the vegetation and re-grading the sand, because this once important breeding site had become overgrown and was no longer suitable for piping plovers to nest. Plans also called for building a shallow pond to create productive foraging habitat for chicks (to) be protected from human disturbance.”
(more…)© 2019 Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey