We haven't seen our female Osprey on the nest for a few days now, although with the adults' visits often very short - dump the fish for the kids and run!- it is hard to be certain. She is obviously spending much of her time away fishing, working on her fitness before her long autumn migration. Although she is usually the first of the family to head away south , it is probably too early for her to have left just yet, so we will be keeping a close eye out in the next few days for sightings of her.
Interestingly we had an intruder alert yesterday, caused by another osprey. Two chicks arrived back at the nest ( probably from nearby tree perches) and started alarm calling. A parent bird quickly appeared and joined them on the nest, and the chicks flattened themselves in their instinctive 'camouflage' posture. After a few minutes of watching the intruder circle above, the parent bird gave chase leaving the youngsters on the nest.
It is interesting to speculate that the scare may have been caused by one of the other young Scottish ospreys starting to drift south across territories such as ours. Birds that haven't successfully bred this year usually begin to migrate about now. So it is likely we'll have more of these alerts in the coming days and weeks.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please feel free to leave your comments on the blog. We've got a few house rules:
1. We (Forestry Commission Scotland) will review all comments and reserve the right to not publish them at our discretion.
2. There will be a time delay between submission and posting. Comments posted on a Saturday or Sunday won't be moderated until the following Monday.
3. Please make comments appropriate and relevant.
4. If you've a comment or question about Tweed Valley Ospreys , you can e-mail tweedvalleyospreys@gmail.com as we might not be able to respond here.
5. We won't publish comments that are abusive, indecent, unlawful or defamatory; published comments may be removed at any time; and individuals are personally liable for the comments they submit.
Thanks!