New York State bridges and birds of prey have a history of co-existing.
The winged predators give humans little choice as they choose to nest atop bridges — whether it’s peregrine falcons making themselves at home atop the Tappan Zee Bridge or its successor span, the Mario M. Cuomo Bridge, or ospreys taking over the Bear Mountain Bridge.
After years of cleaning up after the ospreys, Bear Mountain Bridge maintenance workers made life more accommodating for the large raptors. Six crew members built the ospreys a contained nesting site atop the 2,255-foot suspension bridge overlooking the Hudson River.
The bridge connects the Bear Mountain State Park in Orange County and Cortlandt in Westchester County. The bridge is outside of Rockland.
Osprey is a fish-eating raptor
Ospreys, also known as the sea hawk, river hawk, or fish hawk, thrive by swooping down and capturing fish in the river. The large birds brought their meals back to their nest at the top of the bridge. They also laid their eggs in the nests and tended to their young.
The osprey lives in various habitats, nesting in any location near a body of water that provides an adequate food supply. It is the second most widely distributed raptor species, after the peregrine falcon.
When osprey nested atop the Bear Mountain Bridge, sticks fell from the nests onto the span, creating a problem for drivers, said Christopher Steber, a spokesman for the New York State Bridge Authority, which oversees the Bear Mountain Bridge among other bridges.
“In the past couple of years, these very large birds have come to build a nest right on the top of the tower,” Steber said. “That meant very large sticks and even branches had fallen onto the roadway, which was a potential hazard.”
Crew built steel structure to contain a nest
The crew members would climb up and dismantle the nest if the osprey eggs had not been laid yet.
“However, the osprey have been persistent over the past several years” and kept returning and nesting atop the span, Steber said.
Steber said the crew researched how ospreys have been handled at other structures. Along with maintenance manager Craig Gardner, they devised a way to compromise with nature.
The crew members — Jim Long, Scott Annacone, Darius Colter, Chris McDonough, Steve Corrado, and Carlos Santiago —created a nesting structure out of galvanized steel with stainless mesh to contain the sticks that the birds use for their nests, Steber said.
He said the ospreys are now in full nesting mode. They await the ospreys to lay eggs and watch them hatch.
Steve Lieberman covers government, breaking news, courts, police, and investigations. Reach him at slieberm@lohud.com Twitter: @lohudlegalRead more articles and bio. Our local coverage is only possible with support from our readers.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Osprey family gets human-made structure for nesting atop Bear Mountain Bridge
Reporting by Steve Lieberman, Rockland/Westchester Journal News / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
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