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Welcome to “Season Three” of our osprey cam! Get ready for another exciting season of osprey viewing at the Waquoit Bay Reserve, brought to you by the Friends of Mashpee National Wildlife Refuge
If you’d like to show your appreciation for the nest cam, please Support the Friends of Mashpee National Wildlife Refuge! As a nonprofit volunteer organization, we support a wide variety of education, research and stewardship projects within the Mashpee Refuge to ensure the long-term protection and enhancement of native wildlife and habitats.
Thank you in advance!
We are thrilled to offer this live stream of an active pair of Osprey at their nest at Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. The pair are appropriately named Rachel and Carson, after the famed environmentalist.
This opportunity for a bird’s eye view of a beloved bird’s habitat is the result of a collaboration between The Friends of Mashpee National Wildlife Refuge, which helped plan and locate the site for this unique “nest cam,” the Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, one of the Refuge partners, and Comcast, which generously provided the equipment, installation and broadband connectivity to power this viewing experience.
One of our goals as a community-based nonprofit is to give the public opportunities to enjoy and interact with nature and wildlife. Thanks to Comcast, the live streaming of this osprey nest will broaden our reach to all of Cape Cod and beyond. We are grateful for the opportunity to use the live nest cam for observation, research and education purposes.
View highlights from 2024 (“Season Three”)
View highlights from 2023 (“Season Two”)
View highlights from last year (“Season One”) – mating, egg laying and hatching, feeding and more!
Please feel free to comment below with your observations or any questions you may have. We welcome your comments and questions! If you’d like to see a list of questions other viewers have asked, please see our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about Ospreys and the Nest Cam. You may also want to read this article to learn more about ospreys on Cape Cod.
Please note that first-time posters must be approved before comments are displayed, and allow up to 24 hours before your initial post can be seen by others.
A visit by a pair of squirrels on 12/15,from 8:18 (chewing sticks out of view) for several minutes. Even when you couldn’t see them, you could hear them moving around.
It was interesting to watch how they were pushing sticks up from below, like they were burrowing under the nest. I’ll post it to the highlights later today. Thanks!
I could see the stick moving and hear noises, but there was no wind in the tree, no wind moving the shadows – looked like it was haunted. I watched for a long time before the squirrels appeared.
I just posted a short segment, but it was fun to watch the entire event. Haunted, yes!
No idea what this means, but cam not loading and has this message:
HLS.js error: networkError – fatal: true – manifestLoadError
Hi Annie. It looks fine at my end. Try refreshing page or slosing browser and trying again.
it’s working ok now. Thanks for checking.
between 12:40 and 12:54 on 12-04-24 a winged visitor to this nest
Great catch! Some type of hawk. Maybe a coopers hawk or a juvenile red-tailed hawl. Any hawk experts out there?
thanks for adding the hawk highlight
the highlighted hawk was back again 12-07, 10:28 thru 10:50
Here’s a pic of the hawk arriving. Thanks Kevin for keeping a close watch!
Dec 02/24: 2 adult osprey in a tree over the water Eel River East. Seems very unusual innDecember. Usually first spot them around March 17-28.
I use it as a weather cam when I’m out of town!
Every day😊
It’s wonderful to see so many people are still following the nest in the off-season! May we all benefit from the peace and tranquility of an empty nest in these turbulent times.
some times I turn the sound down a bit and leave it on as background while doing other things on the computer. It’s kind of like being outdoors.
I like looking at it year around also.
Yeah! It’s back. I love checking in a couple of times a day year round. It’s interesting to notice background critter noises, how the nest changes, changes to the trees and the occasional visitor.
Thanks for getting it back, Glen!
Cam says “Error Occured” Is it down for the winter?
It seems like the URL was changed by our streaming provider. I’ve contacted them, but probably won’t hear back until Monday. Thanks for letting me know and we’ll get this resolved as soon as we can.
It’s working now. Sorry for the lapse!
For those who will take any action – 10-23-2024 23:20 a small squirrel or a large chipmunk for a few seconds.
We have an osprey sitting on a telephone pole for the last 5 hours, he or she brought a fish and ate that over about 2 hours. Could it be scoping it out for a nest in the future?
Probably just taking a meal break, either getting ready to migrate or a rest stop from some point to the North.
At 6:59am another visitor – this time a squirrel – visits the nest! This nest is becoming popular. Raccoons, hawks, squirrels and of course our residents – Rachel, Carson and family.
I forgot Owls, too.
That osprey, ?Juliet, flew in with the fish at 6:28. Could she finally be fending for herself? YAY!!!
6:35am Osprey on nest eating a fish
Hard to check in to an empty nest 😕
You never know what will show up. Tonight you can hear the peepers so loud.
Looks like a Cooper’s hawk.
At 10:01am we had a visitor of a different raptor feather….😀
Another pic
Tania, great catch! Thanks for posting. I’ll add it to the season highlights.
Great pic…thank you!
On 9/12 there was a single bird in the nest at 07:32, staying until 07:44
Kevin, Was the bird an Osprey???
I think so.
If anyone is in the area and interested, bring the whole family to our third annual Walk for the Wild (WFTW), a 5k walk through nature and trails of the Mashpee National Wildlife Refuge. Our 2024 WFTW will be held on Sunday, October 13th, from 11am to 1pm, with a celebration event at Naukabout Brewery until 4pm. Our route this year will begin at the Quashnet Middle School in Mashpee and traverse a variety of trails through the Quashnet Woodlands, Johns Pond Conservation Area and Makepeace Wildlife Sanctuary. It will end with a family celebration at Naukabout Brewery by Attaquin Park at Mashpee Pond, featuring beverage sales, raffles, kids crafts and more!
To register and for more information:
https://support.americaswildliferefuges.org/event/the-2024-walk-for-the-wild-mashpee/e616040
Difficult to identify if the lone osprey was Juliet, but whoever it was just left the nest.
Lone Osprey is still on the nest. I feel for her or him. No friends
Maybe it’s the angle but I don’t see her necklace. Maybe another osprey?
Juliet is back. 7:35AM
She didn’t seem independent enough to leave but I haven’t seen her much since the owl incident. I hope she is able to make it, wherever she is headed.
I’m sure she is near Racheal in the area and getting fed and hopefully learning how to fish.
Oh wow, Patty, shortly after your comment it appears that Juliet is migrating south 🙁
Juliet has been gone all day.
I have been checking in & have been seeing the empty nest. I am happy to see that Juliet has probably left but it’s with mixed emotions because the family has been so interesting to watch & I will miss them.
Just a comment about a raptors innate protection responses. I just saw a tv news segment about a red tailed hawk that swooped down with talons out on a 2 year old child in her back yard in Needham. The hawk expert (John Blakeman a raptor biologist) said that this hawks actions was a mother’s typical protection defending her territory to send a message and this hawk did live very local to that family. It reminded me of what Rachel (I think) did when the raccoon paid a visit to the Osprey nest (OK, not a child but still same actions), but I am wondering why the owl swooped the nest twice.
I was thinking the same thing that the owl has a nest close by. Years ago I watched a mocking bird in our back yard swoop down an peck our dog in the butt. The bird was more than likely protecting a nest. The dogs response of surprise and shock was hysterical 🤣
It’s making me so sad to see the one last osprey baby, probably Juliet, by herself in the nest alone every night. Will she eventually join the others in the migration? Has it ever happened that an osprey tries to stay through the winter?
What I have noticed over the past couple days is Juliet spending more time away from the nest and less squawking – a hopeful sign.
That was quite a confrontation. I hope Juliet didn’t get hurt.
I know. At one point I wondered if it was a feather or stick flying in the air after one of the owl swoops!
Is there a way to rewind back that far to see this?
Go to Highlights instead of rewinding.
Forgot to say thanks. Got it!
At 09-05-2024 00:32:00 an owl paid a nest visit for 5-10 seconds during which there was brief owl/osprey bird talk. Shortly thereafter at approximately 00:33:29 and 00:34:35 a bird (perhaps the owl) dive bombed the osprey. Not a bad highlight if you can get it.
Great catch, Kevin! I’ve never seen a direct confrontation like that before. I’ll post the clips a little later this morning. Thanks!
Posted. See highlights!
Thanks for the comments and the highlights. We night owls keep an eye out for each other.
Thank you for posting!
Thank you! That was so cool👍
Kevin, nice catch! That was a new sound I heard coming from the Osprey.
Thank you for posting Glen 👍