Osprey cam gets upgrade
<p>Westside Fire Chief Dale Hopkins and Sandpoint Online camera technician Land Otis prepare to dismount the old Osprey Cam, which is 100 feet off the ground.</p>
SANDPOINT - Things are looking up for Sandpoint Online's lofty Osprey Cam.
An upgraded pan-tilt-zoom camera was installed Thursday above the osprey nesting platform perched atop the left-field lights at War Memorial Field.
"The mechanism wasn't holding the camera right on the nest," Sandpoint Online's Chris Bessler said of the former camera.
The new camera has a higher resolution than its predecessor and has 30x zoom lens. It's also capable of shooting in infrared so the nest can be viewed at night, and is equipped with a microphone so viewers now have audio to go with the video.
Bessler said it's hoped the new camera is powerful enough to also keep tabs on a second nest nearby.
The new camera is slated to start streaming video from the nest in March or April, once ospreys make their annual return migration to the Northwest, Bessler said.
The Westside Fire District used its ladder truck to lift Chief Dale Hopkins and Landon Otis, Sandpoint Online's camera technician, to the 100-foot-high nesting platform so the camera could be swapped.
Lake Pend Oreille Cruises is donating half the proceeds from its Island Tour on Sunday to help cover the cost of the camera upgrade. The tour leaves Kramer Marina in East Hope at 3:30 p.m.
Tickets are $23 for adults and $21 for seniors.
Lake Pend Oreille Cruises' Linda Mitchell said additional tours may be held if they fall short of the fundraising goal.
People cam also make online donations by visiting www.sandpointonline.com/ospreys. Donations also help cover the cost of streaming the video online, which costs more than $400 a month.
The camera is a collaboration of the city of Sandpoint and Sandpoint Online. The project receives corporate support by Avista Utilities and Northland Communications. Janie Veltkamp of Birds of Prey Northwest is the project's consulting biologist.
Video Security Technology, a Bonner County business, helped Sandpoint Online procure the new camera.
"It's really been a community project," Bessler said.
The camera has a worldwide following and receives tens of thousands of page views each month.
"It gets a ton of traffic," said Bessler.
Three chicks hatched in the nesting platform this year, although two were stricken with a fungal respiratory illness that proved fatal.
"The third chick thrived," Bessler said. "It was last sighted about three weeks ago."