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hello all. Once again many thanks to Erica for doing our daily post today. I’m sure you’ll agree that she’s done as brilliant job. Thank you Erica.

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Good morning, everyone.

Loch of the Lowes

Fish deliveries – 2 brown trout

At the loch on Tuesday the day began for this nest-watcher at 6.am with Laddie sitting patiently in the eggs, looking around on a breezy, grey morning.
The grassy fringe around the nest seems to have grown apace.

Lady

Lady took over at some point and at 8.34am Laddie brought her a fish which she took off with and Laddie settled down, to become quite anxious not long afterwards, looking skywards and calling. He stood up and was agitated for several minutes and then settled down as any threat receded.

Julie posted to tell us how the Villagers at the loch on Sunday watched Lady’s feathers drifting over the treetops as she preened her moulting plumage.

Both birds took their share of incubating through the day and though always windy it obviously become very warm and bright by the afternoon and both were seen cooling themselves on the nest by panting. The camera operator zoomed in often as the birds got up for a break or to turn the eggs but there was no sign of a crack to be seen on the webcam. Lady did seem to do rather a lot of examining of the eggs today but there is time yet for the hatching. Laddie did his usual furniture arranging. He does like his bark!

We had the strange experience of knowing that a fish was coming in when Deirdre in the hide alerted us a quarter of an hour before, when Laddie caught the fish. It arrived on the nest at 15.24.

Manton Bay

At Manton Bay the team eagerly awaited the hatching of the third egg. The two chicks duly bobbled their heads around, to the viewers’ delight. They seem to have grown perceptibly between early morning and afternoon. Excitement is still high here as the team have seen a crack in the third egg and expect a chick tomorrow.

This link has video of the two chicks being fed
http://www.ospreys.org.uk/osprey-blog/

The first chick hatched today also at Site B on Rutland Water.

Dyfi

Dyfi reported yesterday how they had lowered the screen resolution in order to improve the stuttering or freezing camera which they put down to the unprecedented number of people watching this most entertaining nest. It is still a very decent picture though, even if still a little stuttery. Here is a screenshot of Glesni just about to make off with a big fish.

It looks unlikely, however, that Glesni will lay her first egg now.

The latest date that an osprey is known to have incubated in UK is 22nd May and that was a precocious 2 year old osprey, 06(01), who successfully raised two chicks which hatched in the first week of July 2003. She was an unusual bird in that she returned to the UK after only her first migration and then returned the year afterwards to her natal site at Rutland Water to breed, which female ospreys do not normally do.
She did not return in 2004

Derby

We get a really good, and sometimes disconcerting, close-up of ‘Nature, red in tooth and claw’ when we look at peregrine webcams. How sweet are the little fluffy bundles, though?

Lastly, we are much enjoying the photos of those friends enjoying last Sunday at the Lowes.  Please let’s have some more.

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The Dyfi Osprey Project and the Scottish wildlife Trust  have kindly given their permission for us to post still and video images from their webcams. To visit their sites please click on the relevant link.    Loch of the Lowes.  Dyfi Osprey Project.