I am delighted to say that we have reopened for the spring season 2018, it’s still a bit cold and not very spring like just yet.

However, the golden eye have started displaying and the crows are busy nest building so it’s looking promising.

We are expecting the arrival of our resident ospreys within the next week or so. Our male arrived on 17^th March last year and the female on the 23^rd.

Many of you are avid watchers of our webcam and I can only apologise for any inconvenience that the webcam has caused over the winter. As I’m sure you know we have many challenging aspects to our site but we are working on it and hoping to get it up and running before the ospreys return.

We are delighted to have a full complement of staff this year which should help with the smooth running of the centre this summer. I took over from Jonathan in August last year and I’ve been working hard over the winter to make a few changes and prep for the coming season. Cherry, our lovely visitor centre assistant is still here and will provide a valuable element of consistency, creativity and knowledge to our team. Christy our community job Scotland post will be with us until the end of June, he is hard working and knows the visitor centre very well. Finally, in April we will be able to welcome our latest recruit, Olivia Cooper as our new seasonal visitor centre assistant. She is coming all the way from Wolverhampton and is excited to get started.

Finally, we would like to invite you to attend a fantastic fundraising event that we are having next Thursday 15^th March. Journalist and nature writer Jim Crumley will be giving a talk and book signing in the Birnam arts centre. You may know him from his works; The eagles way, natures architect or his column in the courier. We have tickets for sale at the Visitor Centre and online at Birnamarts.com

Thank you for your time. I hope to see many of you over the coming months and look forward to an exciting season.

Emma Castle-Smith

Visitor Centre Assistant Manager