8/11

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Hooray! I got the bird camera back and took it out to check another osprey nest not far from the Chipotle ospreys from a couple days ago. Call these the Smith Cove ospreys. They nest on a platform erected by King County at a wastewater storage facility. It’s below the Magnolia Bridge and gives you a rare view into the nest, but only if you’re daring enough to walk down the narrow sidewalk of a bridge declared “functionally obsolescent” several years ago. It’s more than a bit spooky to be a couple hundred feet up in the air as the bridge shakes under the weight of speeding cars and trucks.

But once you’re there, the view is pretty good. By August, the youngsters are nearly the size of the adults so it’s hard to tell them apart. I didn’t stick around long enough to observe their behavior to try to figure out who was who.