PPL Montana employees give osprey an Earth Day present

Employees at PPL Montana’s Rainbow Dam near Great Falls, Mont., celebrated Earth Day on Tuesday by recycling old lumber to build a nesting platform for osprey.

“It only took us a few hours to build it and set it up on a small island in the Missouri River below the Rainbow powerhouse,” said Rodney Caldwell, maintenance journeyman at the dam. “We were looking for an appropriate project for Earth Day and decided that we could put some of our old lumber to good use and send a good message about recycling.

“By the time we were finishing up, an osprey was already circling us,” Caldwell said. “We won’t be surprised if she takes up residence on the platform any day now.”

This is the first PPL Montana-sponsored osprey platform at Great Falls. Employees have built similar structures for raptors at the company’s other hydroelectric plants in the state.

Ospreys, known for their large wingspan, are attracted to nesting platforms in rivers because they are free of surrounding obstacles and provide a good perch to observe prey. The migratory birds plunge feet-first into water when hunting fish.