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At 11.25am a male ospre ...>

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Talisman fishing at Findhorn

08 September 2010

At 11.25am a male osprey flew in and started hunting in the SW corner of Findhorn Bay while I was wader watching. With the scope, when he was hovering, I could see a black ring as his legs hung down and the satellite aerial on his back, which identified him as Talisman. Within three minutes he dived right at the edge of the saltmarsh on the rising tide to catch a small flounder, and made off inland. So he's still fishing for his young. As he splashed in after a 150 foot dive the redshanks and curlews on the saltmarsh closeby hardly looked up, yet a sparrowhawk dashing out from the trees ten minutes earlier had sent all the waders up in a panic. How well they know their raptors!

Checking the satellite data this evening fascinated to see that the two young peregrine seem to have settled down in their new localities - Freya in the Ladder Hills and Vega has been roosting in woods along the Spey and then flying up on the moors, even north of Lochindorb, during the day. Most nights they choose new trees in which to roost.

Lake District Ospreys

05 September 2010

On 8th July, I went with the Osprey project team to the Lake District osprey nest to ring the two young. Earlier in the year I had helped them with their arrangements to satellite track their young for the first time, and after ringing I fitted their MicrowaveTelemetry 30gms Argos/GPS transmitters. The young have now migrated and the Lake District Osprey Project are now enjoying following their young on their first migration. They are both doing very well and yesterday the latest transmissions showed that both were in Africa. One had completed a 1360 kilometre flight over the Atlantic Ocean from near Lisbon to the Western Sahara and the other had flown 460 kilometres across the Ocean from Huelva in Spain to Northern Morocco. Great that they both avoided the pitfalls of being lost at sea. You can find their migrations on the Lake District osprey website.

Migration Season

04 September 2010

This evening checked out some of the new satellite tracked birds and found that signals had come in for both peregrines and both hen harriers. The other young female peregrine, Vega, had left the nesting area and moved to Lochindorb and across the Dava as far as Tomatin, at night she had roosted in a tree beside the River Spey east of Nethybridge and in woodland near Carrbridge. I'm already interested to note that these youngsters reared in a cliff face have taken to tree roosting so quickly after departing the nest cliffs. The other peregrine, Freya, remained in the Ladder Hills, with trips as far into Aberdeenshire as Glenbuchat. The two hen harriers were still in much the same place with the female being in the watershed of the North Esk and the male being on moorlands near the bottom of Glen Clova, both sites in Angus.

Alma's Anniversary

13 July 2010

It's a year ago today that Tayside Police retrieved Alma's body from Milden Estate in Glen Esk, Angus. Despite intensive investigation no one has yet be charged with the illegal poisoning of the two year old female golden eagle that we had been tracking. I telephoned the Tayside Wildlife Crime Officer this morning but he had no news of any breakthrough, but the police are always hoping that someone may pass on crucial information which could help identify the culprit. If Alma had not been illegally killed she would now be three years old and the tracking would have been getting more and more interesting as by now she would have been starting to take an interest in male eagles as well as vacant nest sites. With luck, she could have started breeding at four years old. It's tragic she was killed.

In the field it was another good day as I checked the east Moray ospreys in bright sunshine. It was great to find that Beatrice has three well grown young in her nest. I got a chance to look carefully at her mate and I'm satisfied he was the same unringed male that was there in 2009. I also checked the two chicks in another nest, which we ringed a week ago and fitted a Talisman Energy satellite transmitter to the male. They were both lying in the nest in the sun this afternoon, while the female kept guard in the tall larch next door.

Breeding success of local ospreys

12 July 2010

A good day round the Badenoch & Strathspey ospreys - all except one nest have young. I found two chicks in seven nests and three chicks in the first one I checked, which were the offspring of green/white J - the very first osprey I satellite tagged in 1999. She's the one that wintered in Extremadura and probably still does. A lot of variation in age with some nearly ready to fly and the youngest just coming up to three weeks of age.The other nest in Strathspey, Loch Garten, also has three young, so it's a productive year in that area. I gather the first Loch Garten chick has just fledged so they are well ahead of the rest. It's been a hectic summer, and as the days go on I'll be bringing more satellite tagged birds online once they are starting to leave their nest sites. One new young Osprey from the Moray east sub-colony was fitted with the last of the GPS transmitters funded by Talisman Energy in Aberdeen. We've also tagged ten new golden eagles, 2 peregrines and 2 hen harriers so far. Recently, I've also tagged two osprey chicks for the Lake Distirct Osprey Project and 2 young sea eagles on Mull.

Talisman & Pinkfeet

25 April 2010

I was checking through a flock of 2000 pink-footed geese grazing on the eastern saltmarsh at Findhorn Bay this morning with my telescope, when suddenly I realised there was an osprey eating a fish on a fence post in front of them. I could see that it was Talisman and he was eating a fresh caught flounder. It was gently raining so the visibility was poor but I could see his black & white ring. When he flew he crossed over the end of the flock, only 20 feet above the geese, and they showed no fear at all. It's amazing how waders and wildfowl in Findhorn Bay are just so used to ospreys that they show no reaction to them flying just overhead, but if a peregrine appears over the bay then it's a very different matter. The pinkfeet are feeding up before their big flight back to Iceland, with some on to Greenland. I wonder what they will think of the active volcano - probably not the first that some of the oldest geese will have seen. Talisman's mate, Morven, is now back at the nest after her trip to Caithness but they do not yet have eggs.

Nearly there!

09 April 2010

Just been to B01 nest but still no sign of Morven and Talisman. It was a strong wind yesterday so they probably got stuck south of the Cairngorms. Had a check of Nimrod's nest (B04) and the old female was there this morning re-arranging the nest, which is now well built up. Two days ago there was an osprey on the nest and I think it may have been the intruder male from last year so Nimrod needs to hurry back. His four day transmissions cycle means that he may be here before I next get signals. He was in Brittany when I last heard.

Yesterday, I checked 6 nests in Strathspey and only two had ospreys, while in Moray I found pairs at two nests, singles at three nests and two nests with no birds. It's seems rather a slow spring - and I haven't seen a swallow yet.

Just back home and logged on to find that Talisman was over Loch Builg, in the Eastern Cairngorms at 10am, flying due north at 47 kms/hr so he could be home any minute now. I'll try to have a quick look before I head off to give a lecture on ospreys to the Mull Bird Club this evening.

Racing home

07 April 2010

Out for an pre-breakfast check on the local ospreys this morning; none fishing down in Findhorn Bay but two pairs very settled at their eyries with males eating their half a fish, and their females perched on their nests waiting for their shares. Both pairs comprised same individuals as last year. When I checked the eyrie belonging to Morven & Talisman I could see a female osprey perched on it - it was Beatrice still wandering around looking for a male to feed her. She was there yesterday, reported by one of my friends, and when I checked the GPS locations I could see she was there on four of the hourly checks during the day.

The big news today is the race home by the occupants of nest B01 - Talisman roosted last night near Oswestry and Morven roosted in a wood near Kirkby Lonsdale. So both of them could be here later today - Talisman has 325 miles to go, Morven 235 miles. I wonder which will get here first - I'll check later today, and then up date the website after giving an evening talk on ospreys at Hopeman. The forecast between the rain belts is sun with hardly any wind - if both set off by 7am they should get here in the afternoon. How amazing that after the whole winter and the migration they might arrive back within hours of each other.

My 50th year of Ospreys

01 April 2010

A friend, Duncan Halley, dropped me this email today from Washington, USA, to remind me of an anniversary. "First and foremost, if I have my dates right today is exactly 50 years since you started work at Operation Osprey. Congratulations on all the work in species restoration since then. To say the least you have made and are making an impact the rest of us can only admire and hope in some degree to emulate."

Thanks Duncan for the kind words. I'd forgotten it was even the Ist of April this morning - I had to stay overnight in Inverurie as I couldn't get home by car after landing in Aberdeen last night because the main A96 road home was blocked by snow drifts. The traffic was still there this morning but by using back roads I got home to find a foot of snow there. Not good weather for the early ospreys but it will soon melt and spring will continue. Just checked the ospreys to find Beatrice flying up through Oxfordshire this morning and photographed by a birder, while Red 8T is storming through Spain. What an incredible change since 1st April 1960 when we were waiting for just one pair of ospreys in Scotland (and UK) with no idea when they would arrive or where exactly they had been. We didn't even ring them then because they were so rare. Now we can study them in such great detail and the British population is over 230 pairs.

Osprey start migrating north

08 March 2010

I was away in Galloway and the Scottish Borders over the weekend and it was decidedly springlike. Here today, I saw the first song thrush back despite there still being a foot of frozen snow in the garden. It was such a lovely sunny day we went to Findhorn Bay at midday and it was gorgeous. The tide was out and one could imagine an osprey hunting up through the channel but there was not one yet. Last week I heard that someone had seen an early osprey in Wiltshire so this is the time to start keeping an eye open. When I checked the satellite tracking data, after being away down south, I found that Beatrice had left the very south of Spain and was now at her usual stopover site on the River Adour, near Dax, just north of the Pyrennees in France.

Snow again

26 February 2010

I received an email today from Rolf Wahl who told me his first osprey had arrived at the Orleans Forest breeding sites in France. It doesn't look like that here, as we've just had another 2 feet of snow in the most horrible north-east blizzards. At the beginning of the week it was -14C and I took the attached photograph at Lochindorb on my way home from a beaver meeting in Edinburgh. To think that ospreys might be fishing in the loch in a month's time, yet at the moment it is covered in snow and goodness knows how thick is the ice, probably a foot or so, and it will take a long time to thaw. It's already the worst winter for 30 years or more, and it's been very hard on wildlife. Woodcock were badly affected with many reported dead down on the coastal plain, the grouse have not seen fresh heather for nearly 2 months, so many of them must have died and I'd be surprised if we'll see many barn owls and wrens in the spring. But at least the evenings are lengthening and soon our ospreys will be migrating north, and another wonderful spring will start.

Rothiemurchus photographed in Senegal

08 February 2010

Hello, Do you know this osprey? was the exciting start of an email I've just received from Jean-Claude Lehoucq, a Belgian veterinary and also a wildlife photographer, who had been in northern Senegal in January. Attached to the email was a photo showing a satellite tracked young osprey and it was Rothiemurchus! Jean-Claude had taken the photograph on 9th January in the Djoudj National Park in Senegal. I gave him the link to our web page for Rothiemurchus. Jean-Claude replied with more information and some more photographs. He told me that he had taken the photographs from his 4x4 vehicle, which allowed closer views of ospreys, without disturbing them. He reported that ospreys were numerous in the area, often perched on the ground or in small trees, eating catfish. Many thanks to Jean-Claude for allowing me to show you the first photograph he sent. More details and photographs on Rothiemurchus’s page along with a map of GPS positions for 9th January.

Snow damage

06 February 2010

Harry telephoned me last night to tell me that the osprey nest at site K06 had been broken off by the winter’s heavy snow. I went over this morning, but even with my 4x4 I couldn’t get through the forest tracks to the nest area because so much snow was still lying in the forest. I walked to the nest site and found that the top of the Scots pine, which used to hold the nest, had also been damaged by the weight of the heavy snow so was no longer any use for ospreys. Over two feet of snow had fallen on many of the forests in Moray in mid winter and the weight had broken many big branches and even the trees themselves. Next I checked a nearby tree where we had built a nest about 8 years ago when the nest tree was previously damaged by high winds. Our man-made nest had also gone, so I checked other nearby trees and found a good one ideal for building a nest platform, ready for the ospreys when they return, because this is a very successful pair of older ospreys, they reared 3 young last summer, and we do not want to lose them from this very secure site. We need to wait for better weather for tree climbing and nest building. With snow still covering the forest roads, it was ideal for checking mammal tracks to see what had been about – I found red deer, roe deer, fox, wildcat, brown hare and red squirrel as I walked back to my car. It’s great to think that in less than 2 months the first ospreys will be back from Africa but I wonder how many more eyries have been damaged by this winter's heavy snow.

Environment Minister's visit to Glenfeshie

25 January 2010

When Alma was killed last summer, the Scottish Government Environment Minister, Roseanna Cunningham condemned the illegal killing of eagles in the most strenuous manner. Later, she wrote and said that she would like to meet up with Glenfeshie estate and the Foundation to discuss this appalling incident and also to learn more about the Golden Eagle tracking project and the ecological restoration of Glenfeshie, by the present owner and his staff. This morning, she spent some time in Glenfeshie, meeting the owner, Anders Holch Povlsen, and the manager, Thomas MacDonell, who outlined the exciting and successful project in restoring the ecology of Glenfeshie, as well as their long-term vision. How I wish there were more large areas of land where ecosystem restoration is regarded as crucial to the future well-being of the land and nature. We also discussed golden eagles and future plans for tracking more eagles, juvenile and full-grown, in order to learn more about their ecology and movements within the Cairngorms National Park. We discussed the illegal killing of Alma and it's disappointing to report that no one has yet been charged with the crime, despite intensive investigation by Tayside police. We still hope that crucial evidence may come forward or that someone will give the police information to allow them to solve the crime. The Minister then visited Kincraig primary school, where the pupils have carried out an exciting project on following the movements of the young eagle called Tom. Latest news is that we have atleast 7 more transmitters for tracking - more information later in the spring.

A Snowy Winter

10 January 2010

I was down at Findhorn Bay this morning and it was exceedingly cold, about minus 12C, even although the sun was shining. We are into our 4th week of snow and winter weather, with nearly three feet of snow around the house. It is now very hard on wildlife, and today in the estuary nearly half of Findhorn bay was iced over. The salt marshes have been frozen for several weeks and the waders and ducks were feeding at the tide's edge at low tide, but half of their feeding areas are frozen. Several woodcock along the shore were looking out of place and probably starving, the deep snow has driven them out of their usual wintering quarters. It was a very different scene to the summer time haunts of the ospreys - and so different to their winter quarters - Nimrod is the furthest away (3260 miles) in Guinea Bissau, with Talisman 125 kilometres away, and Red 8T 135 kilometres north in southern Senegal. Rothiemurchus and Morven are further north, and Beatrice is in southern Spain, this past week she has suddenly had a couple day's of travelling nearly as far as Gibraltar. One of this year's young sea eagles on Mull, which I helped tag for the Mull Sea Eagle Project visited North Ireland in the past week before returning to Islay, and the other one finally left Mull and moved to Jura.

Searching for golden eagles

17 November 2009

BBC Autumnwatch wanted to see some golden eagles for their last program of the autumn, this Friday, and wondered if I could help. This morning, I took them to a good place, but after standing around in the cold for more than an hour no eagles had joined the ravens soaring above us. Kate Humble had asked me about the winter lives of eagles and how best to see them, but sadly no eagle appeared above us so we had to leave. Some miles further on, I suddenly found two eagles soaring just above the road, with one of them chasing a young red deer. I stopped and waved to the following vehicles. Cameramen,crew and presenter all jumped out and we had the most marvellous views of three golden eagles above us in bright sunshine. A really white marked juvenile, a 3-year-old and a near adult; we did not get all 3 together in the same field of view but often two were together playing in the skies. Eagle sightings at any time of the year are just so much luck.

Tom, our satellite tagged eagle, is still remaining in remote mountain country on the borders of Highland, Aberdeenshire and Perthshire; he seems very settled there.

Tracking the godwit

14 November 2009

In the last few weeks, the satellite tracked bar-tailed godwit has been spending most of its time at Whiteness Sands to the west of Nairn. At high tide it has sometimes been roosting at Ardersier, where we caught and marked it last March. It proved to be a nonbreeding bird which summered in the Moray Firth, mainly in the Dornoch Firth and north to Brora.

Today, I decided to try to find it and have a look at what it was doing at low tide. I went to the big sand flats at midday, as the tide was dropping, and first all counted the waders from the dunes. 530 oystercatchers, 59 curlew, 800 knot, 120 dunlin, 19 sanderling, 32 ringed plover and 19 bar-tailed godwit. The godwits were too far out to check for a satellite transmitter, so I walked out over the sand flats. After a good bit of searching, I located the bird feeding with 4 other godwits at the edge of the water. It seemed very attached to a female godwit, which in this species is larger. The godwits were actively catching worms, digging down through the sand with their long bills. Our satellite tagged bird was behaving just like the rest, and it was good to see that it was in excellent condition and that the base of the bill was bright orangy - it looked to be heading into summer plumage, and hopefully next February - as long as it avoids peregrine falcons - it should head off to the continent and then later in the spring to Siberia.

Weekend on Fair Isle

27 October 2009

Just back from a long weekend on Fair Isle. I am chairman of the Bird Observatory Trust and we are building a new bird observatory on Britain’s most isolated inhabited island. On Friday, it was very exciting to see the new building sitting so well in the landscape as we circled in on the Islander aircraft from Shetland. It was my first chance to see the building, which was built in sections in Orkney and shipped to the island. It’s the result of our £4 million funding appeal and is looking on time for opening next spring. I was there with our architect to check progress with Deryk and Hollie Shaw, our warden and administrator, who live on the island, and to discuss final details of the internal working of the Observatory. It’s a fantastic improvement and Hollie will be taking next year’s bookings from early January. Fair Isle is just such a wonderful island to visit for birdwatchers and island lovers, so if you’ve never been you really should go, and if you’ve been before please come and try out the new building.

As I landed on Friday I hoped to see some good birds because the wind was in the south-east and looked very hopeful for exciting rare birds from the east. There were hordes of blackbirds, fieldfares and redwings, and a good scattering of woodcock, but sadly the rain and high winds made bird-watching extremely difficult , and my best sightings were a woodlark and some tame jack snipe. While there, I logged in to check on the satellite tagged birds, and it is just the young osprey, Rothiemurchus, which has still to settle down in his first wintering area in West Africa. At the moment he is still moving up and down the Atlantic coast of Mauritania. I wonder if he will stay there or move further south to Senegal.

Check out: www.fairislebirdobs.co.uk and www.fairisle.org.uk

13 October 2009

Have caught up with the migration data today, after being without Internet connections in western Poland since Friday. All the migrant birds, except Rothiemurchus - the young male osprey, are now in Africa. Nimrod reached his winter quarters in Guinea Bissau this afternoon, and Talisman is still flying south through southern Mauritania. The two honey buzzards have settled, probably temporarily in flooded conditions, in Mali and Guinea-Bissau.

Probably my last osprey at its nest this year

19 September 2009

I called in at Talisman's nest this morning (or should I still call it Logie's old nest)- in my record books it is nest B01. It was a beautiful sunny morning with a fresh SW wind, and there was Talisman perched at the top of the dead Scots pine, and below him the old nest with the black plastic wrap blowing in the wind. He called a few times at me when I walked to the field edge to take a distant photograph across the ripe barley field. There was no sign of his chick so maybe he's gone. Later I checked his transmitter signals and found that he was fishing the low tide channel just off Findhorn village at 7am this morning; and at 12am (just before I watched him) he was flying towards his nest and at 1pm and 2pm he was perched in the trees at the edge of the wood at the far side of the barley field. I expect he will be the last osprey I see at a nest this year as I'm sure he will soon be off on migration. I wonder where he will go - this is the first year we have tracked a male and female from the same nest. Morven, his mate, was this morning migrating south through the deserts of southern Morocco 2060 miles away. She is likely to return to the coast of Mauritania to last winter's haunts, but where will Talisman go to winter - could be anywhere from Spain to Guinea! Bon voyage.

Nimrod sets off

17 September 2009

It was another beautiful day in Moray, sunny and no wind, so in the morning I went down to Findhorn Bay to look for the last of the ospreys and to see if any interesting migrants had arrived. 11 slavonian grebes swimming with a group of scoters on the sea off Findhorn shore was new, but in the bay it was the usual assortment of waders and ducks. One of my friends had seen two ospreys, and when I went to the south side of the bay, I saw them perched together on an old log on the mud as the tide came in. I checked them out with my telescope but couldn't see a satellite transmitter, although the heat haze was annoying. Next I scanned the river mouth where I had seen more ospreys perched a few days ago, but there were none. Obviously, these are last days this year for ospreys in the Bay.

This evening when I got the Argos data, I found that Nimrod had left yesterday in the late morning - when it had also been a lovely quiet sunny day. He's already made a rapid flight south and as I write this he will be in Brittany. It will be fascinating to compare his last autumn's migration with his new journey south - last night he made a very unusual switch from travelling down the eastern side of England he swung right across into Wales, picking up last year's westerly track over the West country. Talisman is still here but looking at his GPS movements, he was not one of the two birds perched on the log this morning. The others are on their migrations, with Morven in Morocco, Red 8T in Mauritania and Rothiemurchus resting in Portugal, while Beatrice is wintering in southern Spain.

Recovered and released

12 September 2009

A week Friday, I went down to Aviemore to collect a male osprey which had been caught in a net - it was the day of the big flood - and when I checked him out I did not have much hope of him surviving. He was absolutely exhausted and kept falling on his back, but the most hopeful thing was that he was fat. He had put on weight for his migration. He weighed 1372 grams with a wingspan of 460mm. He was unringed so we don't know where he was living or whether he was breeding this year. I took him home and we fed him on cutup pieces of rainbow trout, and for the first two days he had to be force fed on tiny strips of fish. I logged him in with the bird registration people in Bristol. By Monday, he was able to tear up fish and the next day when I tested his flying ability, attached to a long string, he did just about fly across the lawn.

I put him in a friend's big aviary and on Friday, he was able to fly from the ground to the roof - a remarkable recovery. So this morning Moira and I weighed him again - he had gained 82 grams to 1454 grams, and was now a powerful osprey again - and a dangerous handful, with deadly talons and a sharp bill. I ringed him with a blue colour ring HA on his left leg, a BTO ring on the other. We returned him to Rothiemurchus and it was great to see him rapidly climb up into the skies and soar around, chased briefly by a buzzard. And then he set off in the general direction of the late chicks' nest. It was wonderful to see him fly off.

May be he was the father of our satellite tagged chick 'Rothiemurchus'. I will have to wait until next spring to check for colour ring blue/white HA.

11 September 2009

No news this morning of Rothiemurchus or Red 8T - the next batch of signals will not be due until late today. But news of Morven - yesterday she flew back south to Moray and roosted last night in trees above Loch Romach, just south of Forres. Now I expect her to go south - it's a clear cold quite day. Last evening, we were down at Findhorn - lovely there with the tide dropping and further up the bay I could see two ospreys fishing. We called by the south end of the bay on the way home when the tide ws lower and saw a total of five ospreys either resting or eating fish on washed up trees out on the mudflats and one male hunting.

Great migrations

10 September 2009

September is a month for migrations - with our satellite tracked ospreys, Beatrice has already got to her wintering site in southern Spain, Morven is still fishing away up in Caithness (building up fat reserves for the migration), while the two males, Talisman and Nimrod, are still fishing Findhorn Bay and Culbin Bars to take back fish to their young. But the two inland birds from Badenoch & Strathspey are carrying out long migrations.

The male Red 8T, which fishes at Rothiemurchus Fishery and has been photographed by many bird photographers, has just completed a big non-stop migration, which involved flying all last night over the Bay of Biscay. On the night of the 8th/9th September he roosted just south of Kielder water in Northumberland. He was on his way at dawn and by 2pm he was heading for the Dorset coast. Straight out over the English Channel, he continued to be helped by northerly winds and clear skies, he passed over the Channel Islands at 4pm and an hour later had crossed the French coast. He flew on over Brittany and then straight out into the Bay of Biscay. The winds by now were more to the east and he started to be drifted to the west. Luckily he just clipped the very north-west corner of Spain and 0900 hours GMT this morning he was just south of La Coruna. After 27 hours of non stop flight he had covered 800 miles (1286 kilometres) at a mean speed of 30 mph, and I think he's still flying. What a fantastic journey and another superb example of a fit experienced male deciding to do a big migration, with a conscious decision to fly over the sea at night through clear skies.

The young chick, Rothiemurchus, reared close to where Red 8T fishes, also reached Northumberland, and then spent the 8th September there. Yesterday, he flew from there via Harrowgate and Stourbridge to roost last night near Lydeard St Lawrence in Somerset. 298 miles with a following wind is a good journey for such a young bird - but he has gone rather far to the west. This morning the first signals show that he was off early and 10am he was off Teignmouth in South Devon, and an hour later he was heading out over the English Channel 7 miles south of Salcombe. At 11am he was 50 miles out to sea, flying SSW at 82km/h. The weather is clear and sunny, but alas the wind is NE and quite fresh. If Rothiemurchus carries on with this heading he will sadly miss the western end of Brittany and then it's a long slog over the Bay of Biscay, and he could even miss the north-west corner of Spain! My advice would be turn left and head south - but for a young bird, never before been on a migration, he does not know what is ahead. Sincerely hope he makes it.

07 September 2009

Several ospreys still fishing down at Findhorn Bay over the last few days. On Friday we had a big flood and the River Findhorn washed down lots of trees, which had toppled over into the rivers during the heavy snows of February, and spread them out over Findhorn Bay, so now the ospreys have even more perching places out on the mud flats. When you see these trees come down after a flood and embed themselves in the estuary, their roots sticking up, it's easy to understand how ospreys could nest in such trees in the estuaries of big rivers, where there are no surrounding forests. Here, where I'm trying to catch an osprey for satellite tagging, it's annoying to me that they have so many extra perches and my chances of success are much less.

On Friday, I also went to Aviemore to collect a very tired osprey which had got caught in a net - a sub-adult which was very weak and could have easily died. I force-fed him for the first two days with strips of rainbow trout from the Rothiemurchus fishery, but it was great yesterday to see him eating his own fish and today he tore up a whole trout for himself. I'm hoping he can fly free by the end of the week. And talking of Rothiemurchus, the very late young male osprey which I satellite tagged in August and named Rothiemurchus was off on migration today, after an extended tour of north-east Scotland yesterday. So tonight he's roosting beside a small lake just north of Morpeth. Finally, Stan Laybourne telephoned me this evening to say thatMorven was eating a fish this afternoon and still in Caithness. The three males are all still here and all now have their webpages up-to-date ready for the migrations to start.

Late news - first data just in for Red 8T - he left after 9am and by this evening was near Kielder Water in Northumberland - 160 miles for the first day - he's on his way.

31 August 2009

Yesterday, it was a much nicer morning, still and clear, so I got up early and went down to Findhorn Bay to have another try at catching osprey yellow HA, but although four male ospreys were down there catching flounders and sitting around on logs on the mud flats, I was unsuccessful - the high tide was too low to push them up onto the saltmarsh. Two lovely green sandpipers that flew over my head and landed on the edge of the water were a bonus, and a reminder that autumn migration is well under way, as were 11 pale-bellied brent geese, I watched in the Lossie estuary in the afternoon. I've just looked at the Argos data for yesterday and it shows me that Beatrice restarted her migration yesterday morning and is now in Spain, while one of the young honey buzzards has also moved away from its breeding area, so I will try to get their webpages up and running in the next day or two.

29 August 2009

We went across to Dundonnell to check on progress with our red squirrel recovery project; it's starting to get exciting as single young squirrels have been seen this month at Dundonnell and also at Leckmelm. It was a wild blustery day so we were lucky to see an adult squirrel at one of the release sites. But there is so much foliage in the deciduous trees and such huge amounts of food for squirrels,that the chances of seeing one were very small. The beech trees, in particular, are laden with mast, but all of the trees this year have big seed crops, and then today there were lots of fungi and brambles (blackberries)- good food for squirrels, and the rowan trees are spectacularly laden with red berries this autumn. Knowing that Breagha has been in the Dundonnell area in the last week, I kept a special eye open for sea eagles, and in the afternoon one came spiralling down over the cliffs and landed in a dead Scots pine. With the telescope, quickly out of the vehicle, I managed to read the wing tag before he flew off - it was red/white 2 - last seen last year on the island of Skye and ringed as a chick in the Loch Maree area in 2005.

25 August 2009

At high tide this afternoon, I visited Findhorn Bay to check if the male ospreys were starting to sit around on the fence posts in the salt marsh. It was a very high tide and much of the marsh was inundated by seawater with lots of redshanks, curlews and gulls searching for food at the tide edge. And then as I swept round with my binoculars I could see two male ospreys perched on their usual posts. One was unringed but I was pretty sure that the other one, when I zoomed in with my scope, was ringed with a pale yellow colour ring. This was almost certainly the male that tried to take over Nimrod's nest in April. I have one satellite transmitter still to use and this male would be an excellent bird to track. Maybe I can catch him in the next week or so.

I've seen up to 4 male ospreys fishing in the last week when the tide has been low, and one of them would surely have been Morven's mate. See the map below to see the locations used by him (white dots) and by his near neighbour Nimrod (red dots). It's very interesting to see that they regularly use different locations on the coast. Morven came back over the Moray Firth last Saturday and the data suggests she did come back through her nesting area, but she was certainly not there in the evening. Her chick was standing on the nest giving hunger calls to encourage his father to come back with a fish, but he soon flew off and was mobbed by a host of young swallows, which were hawking for insects over the barley field. I guess that Morven's next signals will show that she is well down through the country like last year.

Beatrice has decided to stop over on the same river system (L'Adour) in south-west France which she visited last autumn and this spring. Just further north is one of the young ospreys from Loch Garten, which I helped satellite tag in the summer, which has decided to stop over in the estuary of the Gironde. We still have three male ospreys and one very late chick to leave Scotland and once they have set off on their migrations, we will update their individual pages.

The female Woodcock,named Askaig , is still on her breeding grounds in Siberia and it's going to be very interesting to learn when she sets off and which route she will use to come back to Scotland, if in fact that is what she is going to do. The two young honey buzzards, that I satellite tagged, are starting to move around and have been up to 2 miles from their nest. I'm not sure if they are searching for their own food or are following their parents but they do come back to the nest wood in the evening.

Morven flies north to Caithness!

20 August 2009

No wonder I didn't see Morven on the 18th when I checked her eyrie - she had flown north instead of setting off for Africa! Her transmitter is unfortunately playing up and only when it is in full sunlight does the battery charge enough to transmit. But three signals came in last night which showed that when the rainy weather cleared late on Monday morning she set off across the Moray Firth to Sutherland and almost certainly on to her last summer's haunts in Caithness. What an interesting bird she is - I did not expect her to follow her last year's behaviour now that she has a mate, a nest and a chick, but there goes. I hope some of the Caithness birdwatchers report her fishing at Loch Calder or Loch Olginey for that is where I expect her to go. Then will she come back and call by her nest to check out her chick before the southward migration?

18 August 2009

This afternoon, when I checked, I saw that Beatrice had reached her River Adour stop-over in SW France, so I decided to go round the local ospreys this evening and found Nimrod flying over his eyrie; his mate saw me first and had flown up alarm calling, and in the distance I heard the youngster sqeaking. This chick will probably take until early September to depart so Nimrod will be around for a while yet - but it was good to see him before he heads off back to Africa. I found Morven's nest empty but with careful searching I found their chick perched low in an oak tree on the woodland edge several hundred yards from the eyrie. There was no sign of Morven and it would not surprise me to find, when her transmitter next sends in data, that she has set off on migration. Down at Findhorn Bay the tide was out and after searching the mudflats with my scope I found one male osprey perched on an old log eating a fish, and then another male flew inland with a flounder over Culbin Forest, for quite a while he was mobbed by a young female sparrowhawk. But the weather was more like autumn than summer - windy, cold and grey. Various birds have been updated on the website and I've put up a page for the Bar-tailed Godwit I tagged with the Highland Ringing Group in the late winter.

The satellite tracked ospreys are off!

12 August 2009

It was great this morning to logon to the Argos tracking station and find that Beatrice had started her migration. She left on 9th August, just one day later than last year, so it will be interesting to compare the two autumn's migrations. She has reared two more young and they were both at the nest when I had a look on the 11th August. She travelled expertly down the eastern side of the country and last night was roosting near Retford. This is just under 50 miles north of Rutland Water, where she called by last year at the time of the Bird Fair. I telephoned Tim Mackrill and they will look out for her at Rutland today; she's a bit early for the Bird Fair, but maybe she'll hang on there. Richard Thaxton texted me yesterday to say that one of the young ospreys from Loch Garten had reached Wales - here's wishing it a successful migration. Finally, I took Gandalf, the eagle owl, who has helped me catch some adult ospreys this summer, back to his home at the Falconry Centre at Huntly - his summer holidays are over!

10 August 2009

It's been a real rollercoaster in early August with many projects on the go, but sadly it started off badly with the news about the illegal killing of the young eagle, named Alma, which we had been tracking for two years. On 3rd August, this involved me doing a live interview to the evening BBC programme The One Show, from a satellite truck parked at Loch Morlich linking to the studio. It followed on from a story that they had filmed earlier in the summer at Glenfeshie on the satellite tracking of Tom and Alma, which also included the schoolchildren at Alvie primary school. Fortunately the weather held that evening which gave a beautiful backdrop of the Cairngorms. There's been lots of contact about this disgraceful affair. The owner and manager of Glenfeshie are very annoyed that this bird has been killed. It demonstrates that there are hunting estates, like Glenfeshie, which carry out excellent ecological and ethical management, but there are also places where everything is killed which might be thought to interfere with red grouse. People have asked what they can do about it. Well you can express your concern and anger, by writing to the Minister of the Environment in the Scottish Government, your MSP or MP, and the chairman of Scottish Natural Heritage.

Then things got better, and I was absolutely delighted to get an email from John Lycett telling me he had seen a young red squirrel in his garden near Ullapool, which is the first evidence that our red squirrel project to translocate and restore red squirrels to Wester Ross is proving successful. I’ll try to find time to put up a web page on the squirrel project . It was then exciting to find this year's nest of the pair of honey buzzards we studied last year, and to find two big chicks in the nest along with a good supply of wasp comb and grubs. We ringed and tagged them as part of the honey buzzard migration project, and will paste up details of their migrations when they start to move in the autumn. And then today, I ringed the latest young ospreys I've ever ringed, a brood of three in excellent condition, which will still be with us in September.

ospreys are fledging

25 July 2009

After being in England for a few days, I went round the local ospreys this afternoon. Morven was feeding her large single chick and several times it spread its wings and flapped; it won't be long until it flies. Nimrod is busy hunting for fish and has at least one young, but on several recent occasions when I've tried to see how many, it's been raining so the chick or chicks have been laying flat in the nest. Beatrice has two young and they have been flying for some days. Just like last year, her behaviour has dramatically changed in the last week, and surprisingly for a female osprey she has been leaving the nest to catch fish. But for her it's not local, she's been flying to Speyside and fishing along the river Avon, and on three nights she's actually roosted there as well - she must be getting fed up with being hassled by her large chicks, when she visits her nest. I guess it won't be long before she leaves on migration. I also checked out Findhorn Bay, and there as the tide went out, there was a male osprey eating a flatfish on a log out on the mud flats - when the males start spending more time down in the bay it's an indicator that their chicks are close to fledging or are free flying around the eyries. The ospreys season marches on.

Catching new males for satellite tracking

19 July 2009

At last it's stopped raining, so I decided that we would try to catch two known male ospreys in order to fit satellite transmitters so that I could carry out more research on the hunting behaviour of male ospreys in Scotland and also to study their migrations. Steve and Amy had come up from the Lake District for the weekend to help, so we first of all went to Logie’s old nest in the morning. Her old mate is the regular breeding male, and this year is mated to Morven and they have one big chick. We put out an eagle owl as a decoy and a Dho Gaza net (she is an old eagle owl, named Gandalf, kindly on a short loan from John Barrie of the Bird of Prey Centre near Huntly). Quickly we had caught him, and he was in excellent condition, so I fitted one of our new Microwave Telemetry Argos GPS transmitters (kindly funded by Talisman Energy UK in Aberdeen), and released him in view of his nest. Since then, regular transmissions have shown him travelling as far as Findhorn Bay to bring back fish to the nest for Morven and their chick. Before he migrates, we will set up a page on this website to record details of his life and his migration.

After such a good start, we went in the afternoon to Badenoch and Strathspey, to a new nest established last year, which now has two big young. There we caught both adults, the female was unringed. She was in excellent condition, weighing in at 1872 grams, and was just finishing her summer moult. I marked her with one of our new colour rings, blue/white AB and then released her. Her mate carried a red/white colour ring 8T, which showed that I had ringed him as a chick at a nest on the RSPB Abernethy Forest reserve on 15 July 2001. He has been seen regularly at the Rothiemurchus Fishery near Aviemore and has been photographed there catching rainbow trout. I fitted him with one of the new transmitters and we released him. Since then he's been regularly back to the fishery catching fish for his family, and on one occasion he was many miles away looking for brown trout in the River Tromie. Red 8T will also have a webpage soon which will give details of his life and migration. We returned home very happy that fieldwork, for once, had been so successful.

Translocating young ospreys in Andalusia

09 July 2009

Just back from Inverness airport after sending off seven young ospreys to the Spanish reintroduction project in Andalusia. They have been collected from nests, in Moray, Inverness and Badenoch & Strathspey, on Forestry Commission or private land containing two or more young. This is carried out using a special licence from Scottish Natural Heritage, and it is a continuation of the project started five years ago. The great news this summer is that a young female osprey translocated from Scotland four years ago has mated with a translocated German osprey of the same age and they have reared three young on the Odiel marshes west of Seville. Ospreys had been extinct in mainland Spain for half a century or more, before this project. This year's chicks were flown by Flybe from Inverness to Malaga, via London Gatwick. Dalcross Cargo organised all the arrangements and Tim Mackrill, from the Rutland Water Osprey project took them from London Gatwick to Southampton and fed them again before departure.

Satellite tagging the Loch Garten chicks

06 July 2009

I went off early to Loch Garten to ring this year's young at the RSPB nest and to fit satellite transmitters to the two larger young for Richard Thaxton, the site manager. After several very hot days, it was a cool grey morning when we walked out to the famous nest. I decided to ring the smallest chick at the base of the tree so that it could be then put back in the nest, so that the female could return to the eyrie trees. The two larger chicks were taken back to the osprey centre, where I ringed and measured them, and then fitted the satellite transmitters, exactly the same as last year. It was great to see such well fed young, after the trials and tribulations of earlier in the season, when first of all the male became tangled in nylon fishing line, and then for a short time he stopped bringing fish to the nest. It was a stressful time for the staff at Loch Garten and on both occasions my advice to them was to wait and see - and both times the problem went away. The three chicks were females, weighing between 1646 and 1790 grams. After the radios were fitted the two chicks were replaced in the nest to join their younger sibling. Here's hoping they have a successful migration to West Africa.

30 June 2009

My sincere apologies for the lengthy gap in information. Last spring it was clear to me that my old system of updating the website was too complicated and it was not possible for me to change the content when I was away from my office. I discussed our website needs with Marc Hindley, a web designer in the local town, Forres. He came up with a new system and design, and I have been trying to get the content changed over from the whole web pages. It's not been the best time of the year for making these changes, but it was essential to do so before the start of the next migration season in August. So - here is the new product and I hope you find your way around it easier than before and that you will appreciate the quicker updates that are now possible. Please give me time to get the various pages updated as we go along.

I was out early this morning checking local ospreys and they were all tending young, in fact it's looking like a very good year for breeding. We have been tracking Nimrod on his daily hunting forays for fish and he has been travelling quite long distances to inland lochs for brown trout and down to Findhorn Bay and the coast for flounders. The two females, Morven and Beatrice, both have chicks. Golden eagles have not done so well, probably because of bad weather in April, and the two nests which we visited last summer to satellite tag eaglets have both failed.

Helping track sea eagles on Mull

26 June 2009

Camped overnight on the shores of the Sound of Mull and this morning caught the first ferry across to the island. Met by Dave Sexton (RSPB Mull Officer) who took me off for a good breakfast before our day's fieldwork. David had asked me to help the Mull Sea Eagle Project by fitting their satellite transmitters to 2 young sea eagles. Justin Grant was doing the climbing to the nest and lowering the big chicks to the ground. We tagged one young sea eagle in the morning on private land, and a second young in the afternoon in a Forestry Commission wood. Great to be back on the island of Mull and to hear how well the sea eagles are doing this summer. I remember long ago visiting the first nesting attempts in the early 1980s when I was the RSPB North Scotland Officer.

11 May 2009

Sorry it's been a long time since I added a blog but life has been hectic with many things - fieldwork, lectures and Fair Isle Bird Observatory business. (We're building a new Bird Observatory on the beautiful remote sea bird island of Fair Isle and we've raised 92% of the £4 million cost - check it out on www.fairislebirdobs.co.uk and if you can help with a donation, FIBOT will be very grateful). Despite the cold wet gales of last week, the ospreys are safely incubating and I have not found any storm damaged nests. Our three satellite tagged birds are all involved in incubating eggs but sadly there's been no sign of Logie.

Last evening, I was standing in the garden trying to photograph a roding woodcock at dusk. At 9.30pm he arrived overhead but not from the direction of the evening before so I missed him with my telephoto lens. After ten minutes he was back on a different track and I again missed a good photo, but by then it was getting dark. I'll try again. Then this morning I checked Askaig's satellite radio position and she had moved another 750 kilometres to the NE and was now in northern Russia, 250 kilometres east of Arkangel. May be she will now stop and get down to the business of breeding. I find it amazing that the woodcocks around my garden in winter travel to Scandinavia and Russia to breed, while the bird I watched last night, which will breed here, wintered further south, probably in Ireland. A complete change over involving the same species.

25 April 2009

Visited Nimrod's nest site at 11am and at last caught him 'at home'. He was perched on the top most branch and nearby was his mate standing in the nest, squeaking at him to go and bring back a fish. It all looked settled and soon they should be incubating eggs - the nest is certainly ready - thanks in many ways to the amount of nest building put in by the new male 'yellow HA', who tried to take over the nest. He's been ousted by Nimrod and I wonder where he's gone - has he started to build a new nest?, has he found a mate?, will he breed this summer?. Three year old ospreys looking for mates and nests will still be arriving - so there's still hope. I took this photograph of yellow HA on the salt marsh at Findhorn Bay in late summer 2007.

There was probably a fight between females at another of the nests in Moray because I had a good look at the bird at the nest yesterday, and she was unringed, whereas the regular female is colour ringed - and I was sure she had arrived at the nest earlier. About half the pairs are now on eggs but a few nests only had singles - this year there have been slow arrivals.

Alma and Tom, the immature golden eagles have had a settled few weeks at opposite ends of the Cairngorms, and the two young sea eagles, we are satellite tracking, are both settled on Mull, following Breagha trip to Rum, Canna and Skye and back.

Check out the woodcock page - it is a really exciting look at the spring migration of two woodcock from the island of Islay - they are beautiful and enigmatic waders, and it's very interesting to learn more about them. One male has been roding at dusk over my garden, here in Moray, for the last week or so - I wonder where he winters - probably Ireland.

22 April 2009

I've been several times to Nimrod's nesting site in last couple days and frustratingly have not seen him there, but it's a very difficult place to overlook and there are hidden perches. This evening his GPS fixes came through, showing that he is regularly at the nest of in a favourite roost tree about 100 metres away. The great interest in having a transmitter on a male is that I can check his daily routines. On the 19th April he was fishing for small brown trout at Lochindorb at 11am and then after flounders off Nairn Bar at 6pm; he's also visited fishing ponds at Glenferness and Auldearn. This will be some interesting research and I intend to track more males. The females, meantime, are just around their nests, by yesterday neither Morven or Beatrice had started laying, but they must be close.

Out early today monitoring nests on the lower River Spey, and found three pairs incubating eggs, and solitary males at the other two nests - it's been a late season for some of them, although four ospreys together over my house this afternoon suggest that more have arrived - the local male was seeing off the intruders. On Monday, watched an old pair building a new nest in a tall precarious dead tree - the main trunk had collapsed under the weight of snow in January - already they have built half the nest and should be ready to lay there early next week. At the next nest, I managed at last to read the colour ring of the male - a chick I ringed in 1991 and hadn't seen since.

Talking of colour rings, thanks very much to the people who have sent in colour rings (including visitors to Mallorca, who had photographed an osprey with a green/white colour ring number 11 - it's a local male caught and ringed by Spanish osprey reserachers in February). If you take digital pictures of ospreys, including flying shots, checks for rings by zooming in on the computer screen.

15 April 2009

Foggy today and it did not clear until 11am, when I went to check for Nimrod - the female was on the eyrie but no sign of a male - and then perched on the tall branch above the nest (see photo to right) so he must have been away trying for fish or had Nimrod arrived and they were away fighting.? Next to Logie's nest, where Morven was arranging the nest so she is settled and sadly still no sign of Logie.

Checked Nimrod's nest again at 3.25pm; female standing in eyrie looking anxiously around and then I heard male ospreys calling - tchup - tchup - a sure sign of disagreement - then a male osprey landed beside the female, and I was sure it was Nimrod, but she chased him off. Then the males chased around the tree tops and I positively identified Nimrod back at his last year's nest. They continued calling and chasing, with the female in flight as well; after some minutes she landed back on the top branch. Nimrod landed on a tall tree some distance from the nest and the intruder male dived and knocked him off his perch. They continued wheeling around over the tree tops, and the female returned to the eyrie. Nimrod landed back on a tree top 100 metres from the nest, and without disturbing him, I got the first photo of him back in Moray (see left). Male HA had landed somewhere else in the area but I could not see him, so I left them to their contest. Nimrod built the nest in 2007 and reared 3 chicks there in 2008, so he should win the battle, and we will find out in the next couple of days. These conflicts can be aggressive and there have been rare cases of fatal injuries.

14 April 2009

Visited Nimrod's eyrie three times today and at each visit the new male HA was at the nest, in the afternoon he brought a nice trout to the nest - dashed back at 7.30pm but still no sign of Nimrod - guess the weather has been overcast further south in the mountains - surely he'll be back tomorrow - I wonder if he will succeed in shifting the intruder, which has now invested a good deal of time and work at the site. Checking other nest sites during the day - great to see an old regular female of 18 years (the first osprey I satellite tracked back in 1999 - which wintered in Extremadura and probably still does), and also pleased to see a pair rebuilding in a dead Scots pine, which had lost their old nest in the heavy snow falls of February. In my travels saw two red kites, which is unusual in Moray and Nairn..

13 April 2009

My attention changed to Nimrod's nest and I was there three times - the first at 7.30am - still no sign of Nimrod, but I managed to read the colour ring on the new male. I had ringed him in a nearby nest in July 2003, so he's 6 years old and should be breeding. He has been very busy nest building, and on the first visit he had just fed on a fish before handing it over to the female, so he's looking settled. I was surprised in the afternoon to still not find Nimrod - it's been such beautiful weather in Scotland. Later when the satellite transmission came through, I found out that Nimrod had been delayed in western France by poor weather, and only this morning did the weather improve and he was able to get across the English Channel and head north, and by 7.30 pm he was heading north off Liverpool. He should be home tomorrow and will then have to sort things out at the nest - I'll try to be there to see the action - and I expect the intruding male will be ousted. Hope he finds a lone female with a nest somewhere in the district.

12 April 2009

Early visit to check showed that it was Morven (white/black PE colour ring instead of Logie's inscription AN) - and she looks settled at Logie's nest - the male nest building and the pair mating. Last spring Morven was at this nest as the intruder, but her perserverance may have paid off because if Logie does not return from migration, Morven will be the new female at this nest. It was a beautiful sunny morning and this photo at 7am shows the male osprey (Logie' mate last few years) hovering in front of Morven, perched on the top of the dead Scots pine next to the eyrie tree.

North of the Pyrenees

14 March 2009

I've been a few days near Tarifa in southern Spain (very strong winds in the Straits - no good for migration from Africa) at our annual meeting of the Osprey Reintroduction project in Andalusia so I've been checking on the birds from afar - this evening I've checked on Beatrice, she is stopping over on the Adour river north of the Pyrenees, while Nimrod and Morven are still to start their migrations. I've updated Beatrice's page and will get the rest updated over the weekend.

11 March 2009

Better late than never - I went to see Beatrice's winter quarters. En route to the annual meeting of the Andalucia Osprey Reintroduction Project, I was collected from Malaga airport by Juan Jose Mejias, and taken by 4x4 to the River Guadiaro. A lovely hot afternoon with swallows and house martins skimming the meadows, and Spain looking very green after a wet winter. We checked out Beatrice's favourite roosting and fishing sites on the river (alas she had left 3 days ago) but it was easy to see her haunts from the GPS positions. The farmers were harvesting the orange crop and I will always now remember her winter home as a place of oranges - looking across the orange groves laden with fruit to the eucalyptus trees growing along the river, which were her roosts. The area is a mix of farms, orange groves, cattle range, with local roads and power lines, in fact a much busier locality than her nesting area. It's not far from the busy coastal motorway.

08 March 2009

Beatrice is off!! It's snowing again outside and not migration looking weather but I've just checked the satellite data from Argos in Toulouse and found that one of the satellite tracked ospreys has started migrating and it's not the furthest away Nimrod in Guinea Bissau, but the nearest in Spain - Beatrice. She's already flown 305 kilometres - if she keeps up this rate she will be back home in March - but there's a long way to go yet and probably weather events in her path.

I'm excited that another osprey season will soon be underway in Scotland - this past week I've checked 14 ospreys nest to see whether the December gales or the heavy snow in January has caused problems - two nests have gone. Yesterday, we climbed the alternative nest at one of them, and removed a big tussock of grass which had grown up in the cup during the two summers it has not be used. Now it's suitable for nesting ospreys again - I hope the old female (20 years old) will return - she winters I think in Extramadura - or she did when we tracked her in the winters of 1999 and 2000, and a local Spanish bird-watcher there is sure it's the same osprey which still spends each winter on the big reservoir.

I've updated Beatrice's pages now the migration has started - please let your friends know a new osprey migration is underway on these webpages.

05 March 2009

It's starting to feel spring like, with some really nice warm days and the oystercatchers, curlews and lapwings have arrived on the inland fields, but today it's back to snow. The tracked ospreys are all still in their wintering sites, but they should move soon, especially the furthest south - Nimrod. In late February, a friend emailed saying he saw one flying north over Madrid and a few days ago there was one flying north in Hampshire. In Scotland, the sun is now rising higher and the satellite transmitters are starting to work better now that the solar panels are charging the batteries. Tom left home again on 1ist March and has been away now for 4 days so it looks like his parents have pushed him out, as they start the count down to egg-laying and a new breeding season. Alma has been moving about in Deeside and the Angus glens, and is now back in Glen Tanar. The juvenile sea eagles are still both on Mull and the transmitters are starting to give more data on their movements. As soon as the ospreys start flying north - we will update the pages regularly.

17 February 2009

The first spring like day here with warm sun shining on the snow - and at last the two feet of snow around the house has really started to melt. Tom has at last gone on a fly-about over the Cairngorms, but came back the next day - it's interesting how different his behaviour has been to Alma. She has been staying in Glen Tanar among the old Caledonian forest of Scots pines for the last ten days or so. The ospreys are all in the same wintering sites and with the same routines, but they will be getting ready for the northward migrations next month. It was lovely hearing mistle thrush, robin and great tit singing this morning, and seeing snowdrops poking out of the disappearing snow.

03 February 2009

Just updated the various pages - at last as the sun starts to rise higher in the southern sky the satellite data is getting better and I have just logged data for the two golden eagles and two sea eagles. The ospreys have also been updated and it will not be long before the spring migration starts for them in just over a month's time.

28 December 2008

New Year Greetings and I hope 2009 turns out to be a good year for you.

Here, 2008 was an exciting year for conservation projects and this quiet time, when most of our birds are wintering in far-off lands, is a good chance to remember the past year and to look forward to 2009. The excellent ‘World on the Move’ wildlife programme, made by the Natural History Unit in Bristol and transmitted live on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday mornings, brought to life the epic spring migration of Logie as she returned to Moray, and then Nimrod’s autumn flight south to Guinea Bissau. The programme brought many new visitors to our migration website and it’s been wonderful to know that so many people have found the migration stories interesting and inspiring. Of course there’s sadness when a well-known bird comes to grief on migration, but it is important to remember that migration can be very difficult and that deaths on these great journeys have been a part of the ospreys’ way of life for millennia.

In mid winter in Scotland, the sun is so low and weak on the horizon that the solar panels on our eagle transmitters only occasionally charge sufficiently to give good contacts, but it’s already been very interesting to compare the behaviour of Tom (one of this year’s male eaglets) with that of Alma, who fledged in 2007. She had left home to wander by the middle of September, while stay-at-home Tom is still with his parents in December. I wonder which is the better strategy for success as a golden eagle in Scotland.

3250 miles south of here, Nimrod is wintering in mangrove swamps on a coastal estuary in Guinea Bissau, probably with hippopotamus and crocodiles as neighbours. How very different from his summer home at Findhorn Bay, where today I watched greylag, pinkfeet and Greenland white-fronted geese. Further north from Nimrod, Morven is hunkered down on the Mauritanian coast, and, from the occasional low voltage of her transmitter, I guess that the sun is often obscured by the wind-driven sand and dust of the Sahara desert. And then, much further north again, there’s Beatrice, who after living for nearly four months on a small river system near Soto Grande in Spain, recently took a two day break closer to Gibraltar.

It’s only about ten weeks now until the first of the ospreys will start its spring migration, and I guess it will be Nimrod, the furthest away. Once again I’ll try to keep the migration pages regularly updated as the birds fly north – I’m sure there will be many great stories to tell. Hopefully, all three will get back to northern Scotland - and wouldn’t it be fantastic if Logie, too, returned to her nest, the reason we lost her proving to have been just a technical hitch with her transmitter. Very soon thereafter we hope to have a new osprey book published by Whittles Publishing, looking at the individual migrations of Logie and Nimrod.

Thanks to everyone for the positive feedback over the year about this website, and to those who bought my book ‘A Life of Ospreys’ and especially a big thanks to all those who sent donations to the Foundation, in support of our work. The total received in this way, via the website, in 2008 was £6700, an extremely helpful contribution in helping us to continue our satellite tracking studies and our bird conservation work.

18 November 2008

Now that migration has ceased until next March, this blog will be intermittent - please check index and main pages for new information.

19 October 2008

A chance to look at Nimrod's movements on 17th and 18th October, and it looks very much as though he is back at a wintering site, which is well known to him. His routine over the two day's is the same - with the same roost site and a two kilometre trip up the estuary each day to a small inlet, where he probably fishes. Then back to the same roost in the mangrove swamps at night. Many thanks to Elizabeth Marshall, who dropped me a note after reading my book 'A Life of Ospreys', to say she had voted for me in the Glenfiddich/Scotsman 'Spirit of Scotland Awards 2008.

I've been nominated in the Environment section - for details and voting check out: http://uk.glenfiddich.com/every-year-counts/glenfiddich-spirit-of-scotland-awards/vote-for-nominee.html?category=environment&nominee=Roy%20Dennis

16 October 2008

Last night, it was really interesting to see that Nimrod had carried on south through Senegal and The Gambia, and today traversed much of Guinea Bissau. I had been away to give lectures on ospreys in Keswick and Durham, and was wondering how Nimrod was getting on, so it was the first thing to check on arriving home. This afternoon, I visited the 201 Squadron at RAF Kinloss, who fly Nimrod aircraft, to do some photos about the RAF linkup with our Nimrod and to explain the project to one of the crews.

The male ospreys regularly fish Findhorn Bay from March to September, and the Nimrod aircraft, landing and taking off from nearby Kinloss airbase, are a common sight to them. These are also the planes that helped so magnificently with the sea eagle and red kite reintroduction projects, by transporting the respective chicks from Norway and Sweden. I can remember many great trips with the RAF collecting our birds, when the Nimrods were coming home after working over the northern waters.

Both Morven and Beatrice are staying put in their respective locations in Mauritania and southern Spain, and it's looking likely that both are at their wintering sites - so we have a real scatter of wintering sites from Spain to Guinea Bissau.

13 October 2008

Nimrod continued his flight down through the Sahara Desert and into northern Mauritania, and yesterday morning appeared to be heading directly towards the Atlantic coast, where he could catch his first fish since leaving the French coast. But he surprised me again by changing course to the south and keeping well inland from the coast, passing 20 kilometres east of the locality where Morven is living on the Mauritanian coast, and by late afternoon was to the west of the capital Nouakchott and appeared to be heading for Senegal. I find it really fascinating trying to understand the changes he makes along his migration route. I also find it nice to think that even with our fantastic technology and knowledge, which allows us to track his movements and correlate them with geography, weather, ecology and the seasons, we will never know what he (or any other migrating bird) is actually thinking. It was probably his fit condition and a change in weather that stimulated his departure from Ile d'Oleron - but had he already decided to fly non-stop to Morocco before he set off? Did he decide to fly through the night, because the moon was bright, or because he just wanted to get quickly to Africa? And then why did he turn south, 30 kilometres or so from the Mauritanian coast, where he could fish, and instead head on south over the deserts and delay eating for another day or more?

12 October 2008

Last night when we got back from Spain, I was amazed by Nimrod's incredible migration, when I checked the satellite data. At the same time, as we set off to spend a couple days in the upper reaches of the river Ebro in the Cantabrian mountains, Nimrod had just set off from his stop-over at Ile d'Oleron on the French coast for an amazing 35 hour non-stop flight to southern Morocco. There had been a welcome change of weather overnight in the Biscay region, and now with clear skies and a light north wind it was ideal conditions for migration. Nimrod was on the south side of Pyrenees in Spain by dusk, but with clear skies and a bright moon, he continued flying through the night, passing over Madrid and then the Spanish coast near Huelva at 5 am. He next set out on a 690 kilometres flight across the Atlantic Ocean to western Morocco, thus avoiding the mountain chains of Morocco. He continued flying south through Morocco and by 9 pm he had come to roost in the Sahara Desert. His 35 hour flight had covered an incredible 2300 kilometres(1440 miles) at an average speed of 66 kilometres per hour. Such long-distance flights, including deliberate night migration, are very unusual for ospreys; we have recorded big journeys in the past but these were nearly always due to a bird being swept along by bad weather conditions. By this morning, Nimrod should be on the coast of Mauritania, where he will be able to fish. It will be very exciting seeing the next set of satellite data, and then to see where he will head for his winter quarters. At his age he should have a favourite place.

In contrast, both female ospreys, Beatrice and Morven continued to stay in their stopover sites in southern Spain and Mauritania coast. The honey buzzard has moved a short distance in the last week in the Anti- Atlas mountains, but has not yet set off across the desert. At home, the older golden eagle, Alma, made a long fly through the Cairngorms on the 5th October, which including a fly past through her parents' home range, were her brother, Angus, is still staying put. Tom, the other young male golden eagle is also still with his parents in their home range.

08 October 2008

Am in North Spain, visiting Urdaibai Estuary near Bilbao with members of the Urdaibai Foundation, including Aitor who photographed Logie in April 2008, when she was stopping over in the estuary. Apologies for delay in updating, but only just managed to find a WiFi which accepts my laptop and allows me to update the website. We have visited all of Logie's positions in the estuary and discussed with the local ornithologists the suitability of this coastline for ospreys. The numbers of grey mullet in the estuaries and along the coast is incredible, so it is extremely easy for ospreys to find food here. One female osprey is staying in the estuary at the moment, and I have also seen a juvenile in another small estuary and firther west in a large estuary there were at least three ospreys on migration, two of them eating grey mullet.

This morning I have checked the positions of the migrant ospreys and honey buzzard, and find that all are still stopping over - Nimrod in France, Beatrice in Spain, Morven on the coast of Mauritania and the honey buzzard in the Anti-Atlas, Morocco.

28 September 2008

Nimrod completed a very competent migration from South Wales to Brittany, and he has now settled in a little estuary to the north of La Rochelle. I think he's having a few days stop-over, but may be he will stay longer. Interestingly, Beatrice and Morven have also stayed put at stop-over sites. Ken McGinigal emailed in with some nice photographs (below) of Beatrice's stop-over site on the River Guadiaro. He and his girl friend looked for Beatrice on the 15th September, but did not manage to find her - he says it was a very hot day.

On the 27th September, another interesting osprey report came in from Justin and Kit Coates, who had been holidaying on Grand Canaria - they had photographed an osprey (to the right) at the La Charca nature reserve on the Canary Islands on 24th September, and noted that it was colour ringed white/black NM. Amazingly, this bird is a juvenile ringed this July near Lairg by Brian Etheridge, and is the sister of the young male identified at Boultham Mere, Lincoln 16th August - 14th September. (My blog of 21st September). They photographed it catching a fish and it looked fit, although a primary feather on the left wind was broken. The likelihood is that this osprey migrated long distances over the Atlantic Ocean, possibly even from the UK or Ireland direct to the Canaries on a strong tail wind. There have been previous Scottish ospreys on the Canaries, but this is an exciting record. As I write I've just heard from the Loch Garten wardens that Deshar, one of the Garten young, was flying this morning in the open ocean between Portugal and the Azores - and everybody was wishing it a safe landfall. Here in Scotland a late osprey was still in the Highlands near Loch Insh on Thursday, seen by Dave Pierce at the same as he saw his first four whooper swans of the autumn, fresh in from Iceland.

Angus, the young male golden eagle came back to his home range yesterday after a few days away in North Perthshire - today he even spent 3 hours sitting in the exact cliffs where he was reared. It is exciting to watch the travels of these young eagles as they learn to explore the Highlands. On the island of Mull, one of the young sea eagles made its first real flight away from its parents nesting area, and the first google map is shown on the webpage for Mara

Late news - email from Andy Patterson (Torremolinus) - "Just a quick note to let you know that the weather down here in Andalucía is vile, grey and with a very welcome rain , at times of >40 litres /sq.m per day, so do not expect too much movement from any of your birds." - so that's means Beatrice and the Honey Buzzard will not go to Africa tomorrow.

24 September 2008

I've just got back home after being south to the BBC Natural History Unit in Bristol to take part in the live 'World on the Move' programme yesterday, with Brett Westwood and Phillipa Forrester. Unbeknown to us, at that very moment of the start of the programme Nimrod had arrived on the South Wales coast at Carmarthen Bay. Now I've had a chance to catch up on last few days data, and find that Nimrod started his true migration on Monday 22nd September at midday and by nightfall he had arrived in Anglesey - a fast migration with cold weather coming in from the north and clearing skies. Yesterday, he flew on down through Wales and set up a roost site in Pembrey Forest, and fished in the estuary at Carmarthen bay. Neither female osprey had moved on and both were still on stop-over (or have they reached their wintering sites).

The young female honey buzzard crossed the English Channel on Sunday 21st - a much nicer day with clear skies - and on 23rd had an excellent long migration down through France to reach the northern foothills of the Pyrenees Mountain chain.

My apologies for not having the website updated regularly over last couple days - couldn't get a broadband connection easily in Cheltenham - I must try to find a better way to access the Argos data and update the website while travelling, may be with a light notebook computer with it's own internet link, rather than my old laptop.

In the evening I updated the eagle pages, Alma had one of her big flights on the afternoon of 22nd when she flew to Beinn-y-Ghlo in North Perthshire, across Glas Maol to Glen Doll and back to Balmoral. Lovely clear cold day and at times she was at an altitude over 5000 feet, getting a great view of her land. The day previously, her younger brother Angus made his first trip away from his parents into North Perthshire, while Tom stayed local.

21 September 2008

Yesterday morning, when I checked Nimrod's transmitter signals I found that he had flown south to Montrose Bay and roosted overnight, it seemed the perfect start to his migration. But today, he's amazed me, because I find that after a short stay overnight, he decided to fly back home. A round trip of 174 miles in good weather - over country that he must know well. But why did he return - it's a mystery - and after all these years it's extremely interesting to learn that new things happen. Yesterday, I was emailing Elizabeth Tindall, who had told us that the female osprey at Wigtown, who was last seen on 9th September, had suddenly re-appeared on her favourite branch 8 days later - Elizabeth wanted to know my views on this and asked if any ospreys had wintered in the UK. They haven't yet but with recent warmer winters it might be possible, especially since a couple of ospreys have wintered in recent years in southern Brittany on the French coast.

Reports have come in of ospreys staying quite long periods in different places in England this autumn. The two young ospreys, Deshar and Nethy, from Loch Garten are still on stop-overs in England and another was a young osprey ringed by Brian Etheridge near Lairg in Sutherland, which stayed at Boultham Mere, near Lincoln, from 16th August to 14th September. This photograph taken by the warden, Steve Botham, was sent to me and the 'blown up' images, on his website, show well the colouring (white/black NP). www.boulthamere.blogspot.com It's incredible how well the new digital telephoto lens can pick out osprey rings, and let us identify them. A sadder account, is a young osprey found emaciated but alive in Weardale on 15th September and taken into care and hopefully recovery.

The honey buzzard roosted overnight in a big wood just north of Beachy Head. Beatrice and Morven stayed put on thei migrations, and there's no word of Glen.

19 September 2008

Up here the weather has been overcast and wet, with easterly winds, which have brought in a lot of migrants to the islands and the east coast of Scotland from Scandinavia. Nimrod is still at his nest site, so may be his smallest chick is still waiting for good weather to migrate, and yesterday there were still two ospreys hunting in Findhorn Bay. Yesterday, Brian Etheridge told me about an osprey found in Wester Ross which was taken to the vet for care. It had been ringed in Sweden and it sounds like a bird blown off course across the North Sea by poor weather - fortunately it found Scotland.

Both female ospreys are staying put - Beatrice on a stop-over just north of Gibraltar, where she must have found a good place to catch fish - although she might be one of the unusual Scottish ospreys which do not migrate to West Africa but nowadays winter in Spain - we'll see. Morven has also decided to rest (or again is it her wintering site) in the Mauritanian desert and fish the coastal waters. Sadly, no news from Glen's transmitter, but the honey buzzard took advantage of a sunny day and flew from north of Manchester down to Coventry. All the eagles have been rather hunkered down in overcast rainy weather in the Cairngorms.

19 September 2008

At midday, it turned into a lovely day - clearing skies and hot sunshine, and a light north-east wind. This evening, I went off birdwatching to Findhorn Bay on the falling tide to look for unusual waders - a really nice selection there, including five curlew sandpipers, a little stint, some black-tailed godwits and four spotted redshanks. I kept my eye on the falling tide hoping to see a late Osprey hunting flounders, but no luck. Then as I walked back along the salt marsh, I suddenly heard the high-pitched calls of pink-footed geese, and searching the sky I picked out a skein of 32 geese several thousand feet above me and they just kept flying south. The first of the autumn for me and the seasons have changed. As happens every autumn when I hear my first pinkfeet coming south from the Arctic, my mind races straight back to the summer we visited north-east Greenland to study geese and while camping there I saw the fantastic white wolves of the Arctic - their howls and the calls of pinkfeet will be forever connected in my mind. A last scan of the bay as the light dimmed revealed a male osprey feeding out on the bay, and he flew to roost on a post in the salt marsh. It wasn't Nimrod and I wondered if it would be my last osprey of the year for my home patch.

Checked the satellite data later and found that Nimrod had set off on his migration - he had sensed the change to good weather and at midday set off on an eastern circuit round the Cairngorms and so his migration had started and we know exactly when he left. Now we have the chance to follow our first male osprey on migration using a GPS satellite transmitter. Already, I've learnt much about his fishing behaviour and how often he took fish back to his young, and where he went to hunt and where he roosted at night. It was good weather in England as well and the young honey buzzard flew south from Coventry, probably to Oxfordshire or further south.

15 September 2008

I was south at the weekend, visiting the Red Squirrel Project on Anglesey, and as I drove from Manchester airport to North Wales it was the first beautiful sunny day for ages - as I looked into the skies I could see it was perfect weather for migrating ospreys. It was an excellent day for them to get going again after all the bad weather, which has been thrown at migrating birds this autumn. The good weather allowed the sun to shine on the honey buzzard, which has travelled south from Scotland and roosted last night just east of the M6 motorway south of Kendall. But alas there were no signals from Glen's transmitter, but I will keep checking just in case it gets some sun and suddenly bursts back into life The Irish observers went and carefully checked his roost site but found nothing. It could be possible that he continued migrating and disappeared out over the Ocean, whether that was while trying to get back to the UK or straight on in a south or SSW direction we will never know, and there's always a chance he is still there somewhere and the radio is not working at this time.

A few people have written to me with concerns that radio waves from the transmitters have affected their navigation. I am always very concerned that we do not cause damage to the birds we study. Of course, whenever we carry out such work there is a risk and we try very hard to keep this to as minimum a risk as possible and there must be a benefit to the species' conservation. We and colleagues abroad have no evidence that the transmitters cause navigation errors. The radio transmits infrequently and only at certain periods over schedules of one to several days, up to ten. In good or average weather, the tracks of both adults and young show them migrating without any evidence that the transmitters are affecting their navigation. Ospreys, like other migrating birds, sometimes get lost or die when they run into storms and bad weather, especially in heavy rain and thick overcast. Then, whether they have a radio or not, they usually fly downwind and hope to make landfall, feed up and restart their migration; lucky ones even survive major storms. The transmitters show that migration can be very difficult, and also the range of difficulties that some migrant ospreys have to endure and how many fail to make it to Africa. It is important for us to realise the enormity of the natural risks of migration and why we must conserve them on the breeding grounds as well as possible.

On Friday, I checked Nimrod's nest site on the first nice afternoon for ages; two of the young ospreys were still there, perched in trees a few hundred metres from the nest. They were very vigilant and gave alarm calls when they saw me. The female has been gone for some time now, and the oldest chick might have left. These chicks have been fed very well by Nimrod, and have had a good long post fledging period to build up strength and fitness before migration. I'm hoping they might have started migrating during the weekend's good weather - none of the three young were ringed as it's a very dangerous tree. As soon as the last chick leaves, Nimrod will be off and we now have a chance to watch the whole migration of an adult male osprey from his nest in Scotland to his winter quarters, for the first time using GPS accurate data. Here's hoping he has good weather and a safe journey.

12 September 2008

This week has been very busy with migration in full swing, the female Osprey, Morven has already travelled over parts of the Sahara Desert to reach northern Mauritania, while Nimrod is still feeding his young at home in Scotland. His daily journeys are really revealing and it's the first time I've had a very accurate satellite transmitter on a male Osprey. He's been fishing in Findhorn Bay and along the Culbin Bars on the open coast, and roosting at night in Culbin Forest well away from his nest. One particularly miserable day on the coast he switched hunting grounds to a trout fishery further inland. His tracks show clearly his return trips to his nest to give fish to his young. I visited the nest on Tuesday and saw one chick, probably the youngest, preening its feathers on the nest and waiting for the next meal. They should be away soon and then Nimrod can make plans for his own migration back to Africa. It's going to be very interesting to watch. He's been in Scotland since 1st April and, with a late started family, his first, and the successful rearing of three young, he's been here for four and a half months. One day I went to the RAF Kinloss to speak with the station press officer, Dawn McNiven, as the base is interested in becoming involved with the project. The ospreys fish in Findhorn Bay and are so used to Nimrod aircraft passing over them, when the planes land at the base, that they don't even look up when the huge aircraft are only a couple of hundred feet above them. Nimrod's page should be up and running in a few days.

It's been very wet and grey over most of the British Isles, the golden eagle chicks in the Cairngorms have been moving about their parents' home ranges, but sometimes there have been gaps in GPS transmissions because of the lack of sunlight reaching the solar panels. I was told yesterday that the same was true with a Golden Eagle being tracked in Ireland, so I am hoping that this may be the reason that I haven't received any recent signals from Glen, who was last located in Co Roscommon. Several people over there interested in raptors tried to see Glen, and Micheal Casey located his actual last roosting site but did not see him (his account is on Glen's page). I hope I hear again soon or else I'm worried that he kept on flying and disappeared out it in the Atlantic Ocean. If so, then it's very sad news, and another reminder that it's a very difficult migration for young ospreys from Scotland to Africa. These two chicks started off with a disadvantage, because their mother, Logie, was so delayed in spring, so they were late in maturing, their mother set off early and possibly their father, after a very long summer, was not bringing in as much food as they needed, and they set off too early and in bad weather. But with wild birds you never know - suddenly they turn up again and confound your theories. Fortunately, the two young ospreys, Deshar and Nethy, from Loch Garten have survived the bad weather and are still in southern England.

07 September 2008

Yesterday was a miserable day - here in Moray it was a cold wet grey day - just not the hoped-for sunny spell in September. Bad news came in during the day when locations for the young osprey chick, Moray, suggested that it was dead or unable to move. I telephoned Martin Scott, the RSPB's Western Isles Officer who lives near Barvas on the Isle of Lewis, and he and some friends when to the latest GPS position I had received, and after some searching found the poor osprey dead in a roadside ditch - it may have been hit by a vehicle - see the Osprey web pages for more detail. Meanwhile, Glen was struggling southwest in Ireland and it was a relief, late in the afternoon, to find that he had reached ideal fishing conditions on Lough Allen in Co Leitrim, and the rain had stopped. Let's hope he can feed up and re-orientate to the southeast and get back on track via Wales or southwest England.

Nimrod, our new male Osprey, was busy at home in Moray catching fish for his young, despite the poor weather on the nearby coast. Several times he returned to the nest with fish. The female ospreys are much further away in the sun, and today's data shows that Morven has overtaken Beatrice, and yesterday she reached Africa. Also yesterday, the young Golden Eagles, Angus & Tom, started to range a little further and both were further from their nests than anytime previously, maybe soon they may even start to move outside their parents' home ranges. Finally, the young honey buzzard had left the Highlands and at midday yesterday was just east of Airdrie, east of Glasgow.

04 September 2008

Good to catch up on the movements of Logie's two chicks this morning. Found that Glen had left the Rannoch Moor area yesterday headed for a circuit of the Inner Hebrides, including visiting the breeding area of the pair of white-tailed eagles at Loch Frisa, then on to the west side of Mull before turning south and passing over Colonsay. Glen roosted last night near a famous whisky distillery on Islay, while his brother continued to hang out in Lewis - hope he also gets his compass pointing south. At last, better weather at home and in the late afternoon I went to Findhorn Bay - the tide was just dropping and within 10 minutes I saw two male ospreys capture flounders and set off inland tp their nests. On the way home I called in at Logie's old nest and found her mate perched in the dead Scots pine looking very peaceful after eating his fish. Nimrod has been busy and his GPS tracks show he has been hunting along the Culbin Bar and shoreline as well as Findhorn Bay; I think he may have been one of the birds I saw fishing and when I checked his nest the smallest chick was standing preening on its nest. Yesterday, Beatrice's two chicks were still at home and being fed by her mate.

02 September 2008

Yesterday was a lovely sunny day, and I went to Findhorn Bay to have one last try at catching one of the male ospreys. it was low tide when I arrived at 10 a.m. and I set up my osprey trap on a favourite feeding post. Just after 11am, the male ospreys started to arrive to fish for flounders in the Bay, with four being the most at once. One male with quite a big fish landed on my trap was not caught, then about half an hour later another male came in with a small flat fish and was trapped. It proved to be Red 7J, a well known male, which has successfully nested for the first time, close to Logie's nest and has reared three chicks. With the help of Ian Suttie and Moira Hickey, the bird was weighed and measured, and the last satellite funded by Talisman Energy was fitted. He flew off when released and returned south to his nest. Since then the signals show that he's been hunting fish along Culbin Bars and the mouth of the bay. As I went to take him out of the trap, one of the RAF Kinloss Nimrods passed low overhead of us as it landed at the air base. We've decided to call this Osprey Nimrod - the mighty hunter.

Really great to get a phone call this morning from Robin Reed from the Outer Hebrides, who had just seen a satellite tagged Osprey at the head of Loch Seaforth in Lewis; it was Logie's young chick, Moray, which was tracked to Pairc yesterday. Robin said he was in a good place for fishing and the weather was much better.

Several emails came in today asking around Logie, but is still no sign. A French ornithologist from south of Bordeaux emailed to say that the colour ringed osprey which regularly visits his reserve had just turned up again, and in passing he said that the place Beatrice stayed on the River Ardour near Dax is really excellent for ospreys. A reply from John Cortes, Gibraltar, to my last night's email said 'it wasn't very good day for raptor migration at the Rock but they would keep a lookout for Beatrice passing by.

World on the Move, BBC radio 4 programme on migration back on the air (Tuesday 11am and Wednesday 9pm) and Logie's summer was featured and I also discussed the loss of signals.

01 September 2008

Yesterday morning checking out the GPS positions of Logie's chicks, both had a difficult day on Saturday and in poor weather Glen ended up near Tyndrum and Moray on the Isle of Skye. Hope they get better weather and are managing to catch fish - Logie's departure in bad weather must have unsettled her chicks, for they left a couple weeks before they should have done. On Friday called in at Logie's nest and found her mate 6R eating a flatfish in the dead Scots pine, but no sign of the unringed juvenile which was hanging around the nest - I wonder if he'll feed it. Yesterday spent some of the afternoon down at Findhorn Bay trying to catch one of the known males. Two different males caught fish, while a juvenile flung itself into the water several times without success - saw the same behaviour last year. In the evening, found that Beatrice had travelled through much of Spain, her transmitter should switch now to daily instead of a 3 day cycle. Still no contact with Logie although people are keeping watch.

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