Brittany Salmons and her family were enjoying a relaxing boat ride recently, when a large bird splashing around the water grabbed their attention. As a member of North Carolina’s National Audubon Society, Salmons is always on the lookout for animals in need.
And she could tell that this young raptor, a female osprey, was in trouble.
While it wasn’t unusual to see ospreys looking for food near the lake, this poor girl couldn’t seem to get herself out of the water. After flapping around on her own for a while, she was starting to lose steam.
“Ospreys are incredible foragers that use their talons to snatch fish from the water’s surface,” the National Audubon Society (NAS) wrote on Facebook. “If they get too water-logged hunting, or too exhausted, they can get stuck in the water like this one.”
The osprey was too weak to get out of the water on her own, but thankfully, Salmons’ family happened to sail by right in time. One of Salmons’ family members, Gavin, jumped into the water first with a towel. As he got the osprey to cling to the towel, Salmons threw him a flotation device to further stabilize the bird.
The bird instantly hooked her talons onto the floatation device and began hitching a ride back to shore. But after swimming around for so long, the exhausted osprey struggled to hold on, eventually digging her talons into Gavin’s arm for more support.
So, Salmons soon jumped into the water and redirected the osprey to the flotation device. Instead of continuing to tow her to the shore behind the boat, Salmons decided to swim with her to safety.
“[She’s] tuckered out,” one of Salmons’ family members said about the ailing osprey as they watched her reach the shore.
You can watch footage from her rescue here:
Once on the shoreline, someone contacted another local rescuer named Holly, who soon arrived to check on the bird. Sometimes, birds rescued from water just need some time on dry land to rest before taking off again. But this poor bird remained weak and unable to fly, so Holly decided to take her to a rehabilitation center.
“I managed to get her into a cat carrier,” Holly wrote in a Facebook comment. “We reached out to Chickahominy Wildlife, and they were able to intake immediately …”
Holly’s mom drove the bird two hours to Richmond, Virginia, and a team of experts led by Chickahominy Wildlife staff member Brenda soon took over. At their headquarters, the team gave the osprey a thorough checkup and realized that she wasn’t just tired but injured, too.
“The osprey did have a superficial injury under her wing, but fortunately, it was not broken,” Holly wrote. “She made a full recovery and was released.”
You can see the osprey recovering on the shore here:
After a brief stay at Chickahominy Wildlife, the osprey was thrilled to return to the wild with her full strength. And her dedicated team of rescuers, from Salmons’ family on the boat to Chickahominy Wildlife’s staff, couldn’t be happier with the outcome.
“It was a crazy day,” Holly wrote.
