HOLDERNESS -- A trio of ospreys from the Lakes Region have been fitted with high-tech, GPS-enabled satellite transmitters that will allow researchers to track their perilous 6,000-mile migration from New Hampshire to South America and back.

The tracking devices, about the size of a Matchbox toy car and weighing about an ounce, were fitted onto the birds by researchers earlier this month.

The Squam Lakes Natural Science Center launched the tracking project last year with financial and logistical support from Public Service of New Hampshire. The center's executive director, Iain MacLeod, who has studied ospreys for more than 30 years and monitored the growth of the nesting population in the Lakes Region since 1997, is leading the Osprey Project.

The three New Hampshire birds are an adult male named Art, tagged at a nest in Bridgewater, and two chicks tagged at a nest close to the J. Jill distribution center in Tilton. One is named Jill, after the retailer. The other is named Chip to recognize the Chippers Tree Service of Meredith, which helped provide access to the birds with their bucket truck.

“It's a dangerous voyage,” said MacLeod of the migration. “If it wasn't, we'd be overrun with osprey.”

He said forecasts call for a busy hurricane season. The birds will likely depart on their journey to South America in late August or September.

The Osprey Project is part of a larger New England-wide study spearheaded by Professor Richard “Rob” Bierregaard, a visiting research professor at University of North Carolina's Department of Biology. The three New Hampshire birds will join eight others tagged by Bierregaard in Massachusetts, Delaware and New York.

Nerve-wracking experience

If they complete their maiden migration, chick ospreys Jill and Chip will not return to New Hampshire until 2014, when they are old enough to breed. Art, the adult, should make the return trip in the spring.

“With juveniles, only one of three will survive the first migration,” he said.

In 2011, a transmitter was affixed to a youngster in a nest at the PSNH Ayers Island Hydro Station in New Hampton. This female chick, named Saco, provided insight into first-time migration as she traveled south along the eastern seaboard.

After spending six weeks in West Virginia, according to MacLeod, Saco got the urge to move on. In October she flew through the Carolinas, Florida, over Cuba, then to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. She headed out across the Caribbean — the most perilous part of the journey. After a 30-hour, 650-mile continuous flight over the ocean, she was driven down into the sea by weather and exhaustion on Oct. 17.

Researchers can't help but be emotionally involved in the osprey journey.

“It's hard not to. Literally, it's like you're looking over their shoulder. We do name them. We don't name the animals at the center, but with this kind of study, we tried to give people a connection with these birds to the areas.

Once the birds take flight, satellite data will be downloaded every three days. “I'll be a nervous wreck,” said MacLeod. “We have these three-day cliff-hangers.”

No longer endangered

The osprey — also called the “fish hawk” — is the only raptor in the world to feed exclusively on live fish in both fresh and salt water. They use estuaries and tidal areas as temporary homes during their migration.

The birds can live into their teens or 20s, and they mate for life.

Once on the state's endangered-species list due to overuse of DDT, ospreys were taken off the list in 2008 following many years of coordinated efforts at rejuvenating the breed and providing safe nesting spots.

Public Service of New Hampshire spokesman Martin Murray said the company has long provided crews and equipment to erect man-made nesting platforms.

By 1999, there were 22 active osprey nests and 28 young fledglings in New Hampshire, with the species inhabiting two of the state's five major watersheds. In 2000, Project Osprey was launched by the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department, PSNH, and the Audubon Society.

Project Osprey installed 15 more nesting platforms, critical for attracting the birds into new areas of the state. PSNH also provided $95,000 for the five-year project, enabling wildlife biologists to focus on the recovery effort.

The PSNH osprey web page (www.psnh.com/osprey/) includes access to the “Osprey Cam,” a live video feed showing the osprey nest site at Ayers Island in New Hampton, where three chicks are being raised by their parents.

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Larissa Mulkern may be reached at LMulkern@newstote.com.