osprey are back

•

Osprey are back home in the Volunteer State. I saw two on Saturday, both perched on nest sites near the Tennessee River.

You have to admire these hunters, they spend their winters as far south as northern Argentina and Uruguay, so neotropical they are not, wintering well below the tropics, terrorizing South American fish.

And look at those feet, those formidable meat hooks that would impress even a Mafioso hit man should there be such a thing. Sharp, strong talons, the bête noire, the dark beast that haunts the dreams of any large bass that knows enough to know enough. Do you think they know enough?

Osprey nest up and down the valley, most often on man-made structures, so local fish this is a heads-up. Or better still, don't get your head anywhere near up or you'll loose it!

  

- Photo by Mike Baird

•