So we are reaching the end of the season for the Peregrine Watch Site. The watch will close on Monday 1st June at 4pm. The peregrines will still be on site but at this time of year we cannot guarantee they will be here when you are!

I thought it would be nice to do a wee recap of the season in photographs for your viewing pleasure. So, here goes:

Our first sights of the birds were in early March when Head Ranger Laura got this photograph of the falcon.

The watch site opened on Saturday 21st March and it didn’t take long for the birds to show their courtship and breeding behaviour with the first nest scraping seen on Sunday 22nd March.

This continued for a while, and the birds treated us to great views of them bringing in prey such as starlings, blackbirds and the occasional pigeon.

As time went on our birds continued to show all of the expected courtship and mating behaviour, however by the middle of May we hadn’t seen sight of any egg laying and the birds began to mate less and less.

Now that the breeding cycle of the birds has come to an end the birds seem to be taking a well deserved bit of downtime, as the tiercel shows here:

So unfortunately our birds have had an unsuccessful year, but who knows what 2016 will bring! The Peregrine Watch will close tomorrow for the season, but please do join us at the reserve for other events throughout the year.

I will be continuing at the reserve as an Assistant Ranger Intern, so look out for future blogs on goings on here at Falls of Clyde.

Sam Langford – Assistant Peregrine Ranger Volunteer
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