Apologies for the diary breakdown – creativity overtook technology as we overloaded with pictures!

What makes following the osprey story long term so interesting is in observing the changing patterns, contrasts and similarities between one year and the next.

Casting our minds back to this time last year we were watching a young and inexperienced bird bride coping with her first season of domesticity and motherhood. In those early days she didn’t do much except sit on the nest and the little camera gazing alternately at the horizon and her toenails. Even going down to bath in the Lake was an ordeal and collecting nest material seemed beyond her comprehension. Would she have learnt from her experiences on her return this year?

Well, it is overpoweringly obvious that she has arrived absolutely confident of her place in the landscape and has made the territory around the nest her own.

What of nest building; a most important facet of osprey behaviour? Last year she managed to bring in only 5 bits of moss and fewer sticks, leaving the rest to her hard working husband. This year she has been making a tentative effort, bringing in moss and treading it down into the ‘egg cup’ in the centre of the nest. Today she seemed to have grasped the idea that ‘a stick in time saves nine’ and came flying in with one proudly held between her claws. However, as the nest loomed closer and the prospect of a less than dignified landing seemed imminent, her nerve failed her. At the last moment she dropped the stick, it whirled down, missed the nest and disappeared through the canopy.

It was all a bit far from her comfort zone but a quick rest on the camera seemed to compose her again. Perhaps she’ll try again tomorrow.