My wife and I were hiking the T-Pot Bridge one day and saw a set of solar panels on one of the old granite bridge pilings just to the east. Then we noticed a camera…but we couldn’t quite make out what it was until we saw an article on the RVA Osprey Cam. Here are the details from the RVA Osprey Cam website, and make sure to click on the live video below as we are officially on egg watch:

“RichmondOutside.com’s RVA Osprey Cam is a project years in the making. It started a few winters ago when our friend Chris Johnson, a talented local photographer, showed us pictures of ospreys nesting on a Richmond-Petersburg Railroad bridge piling on the James River in downtown Richmond. We marveled at the raptors, and especially their choice of real estate: gorgeous views of the river, Brown’s Island, downtown Richmond’s skyline and the Manchester Wall to the south. Now you can add the T. Tyler Potterfield Memorial Bridge to that list, just upstream.

It occurred to us as we talked about the quantity of wildlife our capital city plays host to, that we’d never seen another bird cam that also could showcase an urban center. So that’s what we set out to do: Get bird lovers up close with a pair of nesting ospreys as they build their nest, mate, lay eggs, raise osprey offspring and ultimately head out on their fall migration. But also put Richmond’s abundant natural beauty on display. So that’s exactly what we did — in HD!

I’ll save the story of how you get an osprey cam, solar panels, batteries and assorted structures up a 40-foot granite bridge piling for a later date (you’ll find some pictures below). In meantime, enjoy the show, Richmond. The fun has just begun.”