Sequential habitat occupation and productivity of Ospreys Pandion haliaetus
were studied in the recovering Estonian population from 1985 to1999. Durin
g this period, the number of known nests increased from five to 32. Nest-si
tes closer to the foraging grounds and with more lakes nearby were occupied
first and had the highest productivity, Through a reduction in the quality
of sites available, the average productivity of Ospreys decreased as their
numbers rose, consistent with despotic distribution models. The sites occu
pied first during the recolonization were also those that had been the last
to be abandoned during the population's decline prior to 1980. However, ne
wcomers preferred sites near established pairs. Therefore, conspecific attr
action explained some stochasticity left unexplained by deterministic resou
rce models.