Thursday, March 24th was the first day I saw an osprey back in Portland for the summer! This is about average for when I start seeing them, and it makes me so happy!!
Since that first sighting on the 24th, I’ve seen four more confirmed osprey and one probable osprey (that one was far and I didn’t have my binoculars; it could have been a goose or someone chillin’ on an old nest). And for the last few days, I’ve been enjoying what I think of as a curmudgeon osprey that seems hell-bent on ONLY sitting on a nest that already exists near the old Ross Island Cement Company. Every time I bike down to check on him (which is frequently), this osprey is sitting on the nest. It seems early to be fully nest-sitting, so I’m not sure what’s up. Usually right now the first-arriving male ospreys are sprucing up last season’s nests (or building new nests), and they do quite a bit of flying around and breaking branches off mid-flight to add to their nests. Not to mention, they have to eat (i.e. fly around and catch fish). So it’s funny to see this one just sitting around. I imagine him to be the grumpy old man sitting on his porch making sure no one walks across his lawn. Heh. (Yes, I know, I am only there for a small fraction of every day, and he’s probably out and about a lot when I’m not seeing. But still;)
In other news, Portland is now fully in the glorious time where something new is blooming every day.
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(trilliums are everywhere right now!:)
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The crosuses have come and gone; the daffodils are mostly done; camelias are heading toward done; tulips are still fairly prime. The cherry-apple-pear-plum blossoms have been going for a while now, some spent and some still just starting. Big-leaf maples are pushing out their riots of flowers, green and amazing before the leaves come out. I saw my first fully-bloomed rhododendron yesterday. Dogwood buds are juuuuuust getting there. In our garden, the blueberries are blooming, our neighbor’s lilac is just starting, and my sweet little twinberries, I swear, put out their first flowers between lunch and dinner today.
Everything is growing and I love it!!
Osprey update: The curmudgeonly osprey has a lady love, and the two of them spent much of today flirting by fetching each other fish — such foreplay in fact leading to many confirmed instances of osprey sex. Ha! So watching all that is how *I* spent much of today! :)