Chicks Galore at Aberfoyle!



New arrivals in the Aberfoyle osprey nest



Three osprey chicks have made an appearance live on camera and are already growing up fast. The first chick hatched on Thursday 30 May, bang on the 38 day incubation period. The second chick eventually hatched four days later on Sunday 2 June, quickly followed by the third chick on Tuesday 4 June.

The chicks are being cared for by their parents, Katrine and Drunkie. The female osprey Katrine is nine years old, whilst the age of her mate Drunkie is unknown. Both birds have been named after local lochs where ospreys are regularly spotted fishing.

Last year this adult pair successfully raised two out of three chicks, so this should mean another good year for the ospreys. Now that the chicks have hatched it’s time to bring in the fish to feed their hungry youngsters! 

The male is living up to his reputation of being excellent at fishing, having recently brought in a huge rainbow trout for the female and chicks to feast on. This year we’re monitoring the types of fish being brought to the nest. To date the majority of the fish has been rainbow trout, followed by perch.



Our peregrine chicks



A peregrine falcon family is also being watched with our cameras. Three chubby peregrine chicks are being fed several times and they’re putting on weight fast. In about 2 weeks time these chicks will fledge.

We’re getting daily reports from the public of hunting ospreys and peregrines. With hungry mouths to feed, this is your best chance to see these magnificent birds of prey. There’s such an abundance of wildlife within a few minutes walk of the David Marshall Lodge – an assortment of warblers have returned, and close to the Wildlife Hide there are red squirrels, bank voles and a variety of woodland birds.

Ospreys Return to Aberfoyle as the drama unfolds

Aberfoyle’s ospreys have returned to begin a new season, and there have already been clashes over ownership of the birds’ huge nest.

This year’s drama started in early April when the first female returned and quickly found a partner. Together they set about improving the nest, bringing in branches and soft nesting material, while the male regularly brought in fish.

But soon the birds’ behaviour changed from being a relaxed couple preparing to start a family, to a pair defending their home from an intruder.

When the pair on the nest began spreading their wings it became clear they were trying to put off another bird from flying too close. Sure enough a third osprey was spotted a short time later.

Overnight the new osprey displaced the original female and it looks like she has now paired up with the male! We’re hoping to identify these birds soon and then we’ll know how old they are and where they were hatched.

While a momentary calm has now decended, the drama may well not be over. The female should start laying any day now. There's still time for other ospreys to invade and claim the nest and her mate!

The ospreys can be viewed live inside the Mini-Lodge at The Lodge Forest Visitor Centre (David Marshall Lodge), which is open 7 days a week from 10am til 5pm.

Introducing Tony and Tia Maria!

Well we can confidently say that over the last few weeks the weather has not been great, but on Friday 13th July things weren’t looking to bad. Just about the perfect weather to go ringing ospreys. Our three osprey chicks had now become two, as due to the menacing weather we have unfortunately lost our youngest chick.


Gently does it. Both chicks are carefully loaded into a
bag to be lowered down the tree. 

Our chicks were now six weeks old and it was time for them to have their individual leg rings fitted. As we climbed the tree the heavens open, fortunately this was short lived so the chicks didn’t get too wet. Once both chicks were lowered to the ground, Dave Anderson (FCS Conservation Manager) was on hand to show how the leg rings are fitted to some of our volunteers, who had been specially invited as thanks for all the hard work they put in at DML.

Firstly, two leg rings are fitted, a blue plastic one called a Darvic, this year the chicks were fitted with blue ring TM and TN and a metal BTO ring. Both rings will be used in the future to help identify the birds both on migration to West Africa and when they hopefully return to the Trossachs in a few years time. Once this is complete the chicks are weighed and measurements taken and this confirmed that we had a boy and a girl! Because of this the volunteers decided that we should call our chicks Tia Maria and Tony.



Tia Maria all done, with both leg rings fitted.

 Tony and Tia Maria will fledge once they are seven weeks old, when they will begin to build up strength before setting off on migration at about 12 weeks old. 


Introducing the 2012 Osprey Chicks - Tony & Tia Maria

 



Buzzard is a Go-Go....

For the last few weeks we have watched our single Buzzard chick very quickly grow up and also battle with a range of Scottish weather! The chick which was tagged a few weeks ago as Purple/White 29 was one of a two chicks but unfortunately the second chick died only a few days of hatching.

This video clip is the last footage we have of the chick! It looks like Mum is giving it one last clean before it leaves!

We wish the chick Good Luck and will hopefully spot it around the Trossachs soon.

In other news on Friday 13th, we will be fitting the leg rings to our remaining two osprey chicks. This can be viewed live on camera from the David Marshall Lodge Visitor Centre from around 11.30am.

For those of you that don’t know we lost out youngest chick last week, we believe due to the wet weather that we have been experiencing over the last few weeks.

Also, just to let you know that we are currently experiencing problem with live streaming our HD Osprey camera over the web, so for the time being we are bringing you one of our red squirrel feeders. So why not sit back to a cuppa and see if you can spot on the those red fluffy creatures or maybe even a elusive pine marten! It can be viewed at: http://www.forestry.gov.uk/website/forestry.nsf/byunique/infd-8grdef

Buzzard Cam now up and running, whilst Ospreys hopeful of chicks



An image from our buzzard cam showing
the female A9 incubating

 Great news from the Wildlife Watch @ The Lodge. We now have the Buzzard Cam up and running, beaming fantastic quality images into the viewing area. The buzzards have been busy with the female A9 now incubating eggs (see left).

The Ospreys have also been in breeding mode and we have been viewing images of our birds on nest 3 incubating also. All being well we could see the first chicks of 2012 around the end of May, so fingers crossed.

Not so much happening on our other nests 1 and 2. Although ospreys have been spotted at the nest sites, none have laid claim to them as yet.

Closer to The Lodge we have had lots of visits from our resident pine martens who are more than happy to take advantage of the well stocked squirrel feeders around the visitor centre.

We hope to get the Osprey Cam up and running shortly to add to the images being viewed from the buzzard cam and we will keep you posted on progress.

DML celebrates Osprey's return



The live Osprey nest viewing room
at David Marshall Lodge


A special event to celebrate the Osprey's Return was held at David Marshall Lodge last Saturday (21st April). Over 100 people made their way to The Lodge to take part in the day.

Experts were on hand to answer questions and provide information about ospreys, whilst our visitors enjoyed a range of activities and competitions including the Osprey Migration Game, Osprey Fishing Challenge, Osprey themed crafts and the Osprey Challenge.

Winner of the Osprey Challenge on the day was Evie Yanik-Corbelt who won a copy of Sky Hawk by Gill Lewis.

The day gave our Osprey fans a chance to find out more about these facsinating birds of prey and given the recent activity in and around our nest sites so far, we are hopeful of a successful 2012 season.

Ospreys beginning to make their appearance known

Male Osprey

We have been studying our three cameras closely here at the Wildlife Watch, hoping to catch a glimpse of our Ospreys to see what they are up to. Although no activity has been noted on camera 2 since the beginning of April, our Green DX Male has been spotted on the nest on camera 1 twice in the past week.

Camera 3 has also seen regular activity with a Green ringed Female and an un-ringed Male appearing on the nest on a number of occasions. This looks very promising as we have witnessed a number of mating attempts. The female spends most of her day on the nest only departing when the male arrives with fish.

Our Pine Marten friends have also been making good use of the squirrel feeders onsite and have been regular visitors this week.

Good signs and a fair bit of nest activity from our birds. Hopefully we will be seeing a lot more of them in the coming weeks.

Osprey's return for 2012 Season!

As many of you may have read the Aberfoyle Osprey season is just about to begin. This year for the first time ever we are showing three live nests, two of which are being shown through HD. We have already had ospreys on all three nests and signs of attempted mating between pairs.

On nest site 1 (the nest that we have shown in previous years) we have already seen the return of Red 6A (our female from 2006 - 2010) who failed to return to the nest at the beginning of the 2011 season, but was seen on site later in the year. She seems to have been joined by a metal ringed male, whom we presume is the infamous male from the last few years.

For those of you that want to follow the action minute by minute we will be tweeting @aberfoyleosprey and also Facebooking at www.facebook.com/aberfoyleospreys. We are also hoping to get the webcam link up and running this week, sorry for the delay in this :-)

Other sightings and live cameras currently on show at the David Marshall Lodge Visitor Centre include Barn Owls, Red Squirrels and for the last few weeks we have been catching a glimpse of a Pine Marten, but we are keeping our eyes fixed on the osprey nests as another season at Aberfoyle begins!