By Anne W. Semmes
For 15 or more years ospreys have built and rebuilt a nest atop the great 14-feet wide bronze wings of the eagle statue that looks out across Eagle Pond from its position on a small island in the Pond. The Pond gets its name from that eagle statue, the first one placed there in 1905 by the prestigious property owner J. Kennedy Tod.
Since the environmentalists brought the banning of the deadly insecticide, DDT that had killed off but a very few birds in Connecticut in the 1960’s, the ospreys have made their slow but steady and now robust rebound.
Meanwhile that original eagle sculpture, needing to be refurbished, was removed by helicopter and replaced in 1979, kindness of Helen Binney Kitchel, with the present bronze eagle sculpted by local Stamford sculptor and New York hotelier James Knowles.
So, how to keep that bronze sculpture in pristine shape with that robust osprey population continuing to add their sticks and assorted nest materials each year? Why not create another one of those osprey platforms so placed on Greenwich Point and position it very near the bronze eagle statue?
A partnership of The Friends of Greenwich Point (FoGP) and the Town of Greenwich was formed, the Pridemark Construction was engaged to build the new platform working with staff from Parks and Rec. On a cold day in February a 24-foot pole for the platform was erected in a 5-foot hole dug by hand. What followed were challenging steps to place and secure the sizeable 3 x 3-foot square platform onto the pole. Invasive trees were removed to create more flight space. New native trees were planted.
Finally, there was that 25-foot climb up to the base of the eagle sculpture to remove the existing and substantial nest, with some of that material then transported to the new osprey platform as encouragement. Surely all must be completed by March to be ready for those returning ospreys to their mating and nesting grounds.
Surely the ospreys would welcome that stack of sticks on the new osprey platform, thus allowing the Town to inspect and repair the eagle statue when needed. But no, the Eagle Pond nesting ospreys have returned directly to their bronze eagle sculpture nest, even with spiked deterrents newly installed! And yes, the ospreys, according to the Town, have the final say and will reside again atop those bronze outstretched eagle wings.
A certain tenacity seems to rule within the osprey breed. Look slightly south along the Greenwich coast to Byram Park where a contest has recently taken place between a pair of Bald Eagles and a returning-from-the-tropics osprey pair wishing to reclaim their nest built and rebuilt over the floodlights of the Byram Park ball field. The first weeks found an eagle sitting in their nest. But the latest visual has the ospreys in residence and doing their best mating exercises to bring on their 2022 offspring.
Postscript: There are now 37 osprey nests now accounted for by the Connecticut Audubon Society that runs the Osprey Nation program.
