Welcome to Friends of the Osprey
We are a volunteer organization for the Kawartha Lakes Region that focuses on the Osprey, which is an indicator species for the health of the Kawartha Lakes environment.
What do we do? The work we do involves osprey nest building, workshops and visits to elementary schools to teach young people about the importance of the Osprey.
Osprey in Distress
Please visit our Osprey Help page for more information.
NEWS! Our tagged Osprey are now on the move!
With the help of Bird Studies Canada, and a number of individual and corporate sponsors, FOTO were able to tag two osprey. We now have a link to the signals that they are transmitting. Please go to our telemetry page to read about the project and for the link to the map.
We're having two more contests and we now take Paypal!
Go to our Events page to find out more details about both.. We are also now selling the tickets to our raffle through Paypal, as well as the various events that we attend. To purchase your tickets online, please go to the Events page.
Kawartha Lakes and Osprey
A hundred years ago, long before cottagers started developing the lakefront areas of the Kawartha Lakes Region, the Osprey had lots of places to nest in tall or dead trees. With the development around our lakes, trees were cut down to make room for housing, and old dead trees were removed and destroyed. The osprey has had to adapt and now nests at times in hazardous locations; such as power poles, TV towers or antennas.
What can we do to help?
If any cottager sees an Osprey nest in a dangerous situation it is best to report this right away to Hydro One (Ontario Hydro).
- The Friends of the Osprey do not want any Osprey to be killed or injured.
- We do not wish any community to lose their electric power
- We don't wish to see a fire started by Osprey activity.
Osprey have in the past chosen some TV towers as nest sites. This isn't as much of an issue as there are less people with antennas. However, if you still have a structure like this, the bird sees a high, flat structure and does not know that the tower is not safe to nest upon.
- The weight of the nest will collapse the antenna or tower.
- Your TV reception will become much poorer.
- The birds will make a mess of the surrounding area-whitewash!
What you can do?
- Install an inverted "V" structure above the antenna itself. This makes it very hard for the osprey to place the nesting sticks on the antenna.
- Attach fishing poles to the mast and antenna so the poles stick above the antenna by about one meter. This discourages the osprey from landing
- Remove the TV tower and purchase a satellite receiver system. It is illegal to destroy an osprey nest during nesting season.
- Become a member by downloading the form in pdf format. Print, fill it out, and mail it to Friends of the Osprey at:
P.O. Box 25
Lindsay, Ontario K9V 4R8
Read our Summer 2010 Newsletter online
We have our newest newsletter ready now. Read it (in pdf format) on our news page.