Cookeville Leisure Services is monitoring a rare family of ospreys that has established a nest on top of a light pole near the baseball field in Cane Creek Park.
Marketing and Communications Specialist Emily Thomas said the department first noticed the nest about a month ago. Now, Thomas said the city decided to get the public’s help naming the two chicks in a special contest on social media.
“We noticed that there was a nest, and then not too long after that, we were able to get drone footage from the city of this nest, and there was two babies in it,” Thomas said. “And they’d already hatched, and then we thought it would just be a fun opportunity for the community to get involved in the local nature.”
Thomas said while ospreys are present in the region, it is rare for them to nest so close to town or on man-made structures like light poles. The birds are likely staying in the area because they have been spotted catching fish from nearby Cane Creek Lake, Thomas said. The adults have already been named ‘Salt’ and ‘Pepper’. The two leading pairs of names for the offspring are Cane and Creek, and Biscuits and Gravy.
“It is a rare thing for them to be so close to town, and also they normally hang around like mountains or large bodies of water, so like lakes,” Thomas said. “I think just to see that like, it, you know, local wildlife is prospering in Cookeville, and even though we have all these activities and like parks going on, our wildlife can still thrive in that environment as well.”
Thomas said the department is not concerned about the safety of the birds because the height of the pole protects them from disturbances.
“It is an odd spot for them to be, but they like to nest on tall objects, so for them to be on top of a light pole on a baseball field is very rare,” Thomas said. “But since it’s so tall, I don’t think anything will happen to them, and they, since there’s babies there, they are definitely staying close to their nest and not letting anything get near it.”
Thomas said the city chose not to relocate the nest to avoid disrupting the natural process and the protective parents. The department has intentionally withheld the specific location of the nest to prevent people from bothering the birds in person, Thomas said.
“It’s their nest, and we don’t want to bother it,” Thomas said. “They’re doing their thing, and we’re making sure we don’t disrupt that, that’s why we haven’t given any, you know, super detailed on where the nest is, because we just want people to be able just to see, see it and see it on social media instead of, you know, disrupting this nest and and their natural process of everything.”
Thomas said the osprey nest is part of a broader effort to support wildlife in city parks, which includes maintaining bluebird boxes in partnership with a local group.
“It’s something you don’t see a lot in Cookeville, you don’t see a lot of Osprey, so it’s just kind of an exciting little thing for us to have,” Thomas said. “You know, a lot of the stuff, we have events that are planned and stuff and projects that are planned, but this is something that just happened naturally and we’re able to share it with everybody.”
The city will announce the winning names for the two babies this Friday.
