Volunteers return osprey to its nest

SAGLE — Humans are conditioned to steer clear of wildlife and to avoid touching their brood.

But human intervention is credited with saving the life of a five-week-old osprey and returning it to its nest on Wednesday.

Jill Ham, an Avista engineer, was driving down Dufort Road with her husband on the Fourth of July when she discovered the bird.

“It was right in the middle of the road,” said Ham.

A flurry of phone calls to law enforcement and the Idaho Department of Fish & Game led Ham to Birds of Prey Northwest, a northern Idaho nonprofit that rescues and rehabilitates raptors such as osprey. Ham placed a jacket over the osprey, scooped up the bundle and delivered it to Mya Lundak, who volunteers for the nonprofit with her mother, Judy.

Mya Lundak took the osprey under her wing until Janie Veltkamp, a raptor biologist with Birds of Prey, could swoop in from St. Maries.

Veltkamp said a strong wind likely blew the osprey from its nest when the raptor tottered too close to its edge. It was also discovered that the osprey had aspergillosis, a potentially fatal fungal lung infection.

“We treated her very aggressively from day one and she’s remarkably recovered,” Veltkamp said.

The osprey, aptly named Independence, was ready for her return to her nest near Cocolalla Slough. But the big question on the minds of lay people who assembled for the reunification was, “Won’t the mother reject it?” Nope.

Veltkamp said that perception is a myth when it comes to raptors. They don’t have the keenest sense of smell and they don’t do basic arithmetic. They don’t notice foreign fragrances and mothers feed their young regardless of head counts.

“They just respond to the food-begging call of the young and their parenting is under hormonal control,” said Veltkamp.

Independence’s mother was on high-alert as a Northern Lights utility truck slowly backed up to a “dummy pole,” a utility pole specifically designed to keep the birds off of actual utility poles. The dummy pole is slightly higher than the actual pole, which makes it enticing to osprey.

The mother bolted from the nest as two linemen ascended in a crane-mounted bucket, but wheeled overhead while emitting the osprey’s distinctive whistle chirp. Dad circled from a wider perimeter while clutching a fish in its talon.

A lineman set Independence in her nest and within minutes of his departure, the osprey’s mother alighted on the nest. Dad followed shortly after.

Veltkamp said osprey are monogamous life mates who abhor the cold so much that they winter as far south as South America. But they always return to the precise location of their summer nests.

“Osprey have the greatest affinity for that,” said Veltkamp. “They know, down to the longitude and latitude, exactly where their platform is.”

Veltkamp encourages people who encounter wounded or vulnerable raptors to get the bird off the ground and into a box, and to call Fish & Game or Birds of Prey, which has a network of volunteers who can help out if state resources are too thin to dispatch a conservation officer.

Veltkamp said human intervention kept Independence from being eaten alive on the ground or run over in traffic.

“Because humans did intervene, there is a resultant happy ending,” she said.