William,
The osprey is a good shot, it just needs to be 'overexposed' more, to give it more light, and like what has already been said, it will blow out the background, but that's how it is...
That happens to even the best photographers, overcast days or shooting against the sun will give you 'not so good' results.
The egret shot is pretty typical of what you'll get at that distance, plus, you have the 100-400mm L, if it's all the way out, that lens can be 'not so sharp', and I understand that, I also have it, and the best thing you can do is to bring it back some at 'around' 350mm or so.
I know, it's hard to do since you spent so much money on that long lens, but at the long end, it gets soft, so you have to do what you have to do.
What I would do is to have someone stand at around 100 yards away from you, (focus on their eyes) take a shot, have them move closer to you to around 25 yards, then closer at 10 yard increments, and so on, then see what you have, you will start to see it sharpen up more as you get closer, which is expected.
(Alternatively, you could have someone hold a piece of white cardboard with some writing, in black marker, then move up in increments)
You can do that many ways, but that is the quickest, and you won't have to move, have your camera on a tripod, and as what was already said, make sure your IS is off on the lens, that stills tries to correct the image by using it's motor, you don't want that.
Realistically though, I wouldn't expect a lot of details in a bird over 20 yards though, and that's under good conditions, at least for mine anyway.
The egret shot really looks pretty good though at that distance, I know it's not perfect for the money you spent, but from what I understand, all of the elements in the zoom lenses make it not as good as the 400mm L, but we do have the option of zooming, if that helps. 
Randy
