Whilst our Osprey chick Blue44 was not visible on the nest camera for most of the day yesterday, he was around the shores of the Loch and the movements of his parents gave us very good clues as to his whereabouts.

The adult birds were seen fishing- most spectacularly the male caught a  pike right in front of our Crannog hide.

However, when the male brought a stick to the nest yesterday afternoon, at around half five,  the chick seemed very hungry indeed and proceeded to peck really aggressively at this dad feet, as if that would magically  materialize food! The poor male got quite a few nasty bites from his son, before he took off in disgust – not the best way to treat you father if you want to be fed!

Blue 44 took another short flight yesterday evening, but came home to roost on the nest after a feed, and stayed on all night- interestingly roosting on the nest edge in a more adult pose, rather than couryin doon like a chick.

 Your ranger team has also been out on our other reserves doing heavy manual work control invasive species of plants such as Himalayan Balsam, to protect the local biodiversity. Whilst clearing smothering bracken from precious Juniper trees yesterday, our team found some beautiful Common Lizard- here’s a photo by our residential volunteer Fraser Cormack.