8 inches of snow this past week and northerly winds over the UK has changed things back to wintry – but the ospreys have been pushing north. Today it was nice to see Beatrice not far from my home, but although she has been at her own nest, she was on Morven’s nest calling for food from yellow HA – but he wasn’t taking much notice. It’s about time Morven gets home – her transmitter has never worked really well so my last news was a sighting on the North Spanish coast. On Thursday I hiked through the snow to check out blue XD and he was busy building his new nest in the next door tree (built by us a week ago) and with him was the Loch Garten female, although she’s gone back and I hope tomorrow I’ll find that the old female green J is back.
I had a great field trip yesterday and visited an eagle home range where I used to check a breeding pair, but it’s been vacant for some time. A male was chasing hooded crows and then checking out a fox on the hill top, which encouraged me; and later from a high vantage point I picked out a small new eyrie and even from one km away I was thrilled to see, through my Swarovski scope, the head of a female golden eagle moving over the edge of the nest as she incubated eggs.
This evening, I’ve just had an email from Garry Prescott who got some beautiful photos of a colour ringed osprey at Blachford Lakes, Hampshire today – very exciting for him. It’s an adult female which I ringed 15 years ago as a chick near Aviemore in the Scottish Highlands. The colour ring was white/black SY on right leg. I don’t know where she is breeding, but not in my study area where I check every breeding osprey for colour rings. Thanks Garry for the great photos – one attached here.
Photo by Garry Prescott
