LOCH GARTEN - July 2022

At about two years they head out to sea
Inland Fish farms dont have any use for them

So, my question is : Has Axel been delinquent and reneged on his parental duties which forced Mistle to go fishing and bring the most unfortunate grebe to the table

Anyone ,,, please

Unknown said:

So, my question is : Has Axel been delinquent and reneged on his parental duties which forced Mistle to go fishing and bring the most unfortunate grebe to the table

Anyone ,,, please

Hi Cirrus, from what I’ve seen, a lot of the female parents go fishing when their chicks are about that age -  Loch of the Lowes, Llyn Brenig, Poole Harbour off the top of my head.

Unknown said:

Has Axel been delinquent and reneged on his parental duties

He has been rather late with his first fish this past few days (I don't keep track, that's just my impression).  But it's that time of the season we'd expect Mum to go fishing..

Intruder - it was flying right-to-left at the very top of the pic, mostly out of it altogether - Asha flew screaming after it:

Later, a parent was in the dead tree, something very interesting was in the sky:

FISH !!! !!! !!!

Thank you Glider and Scylla - jury is still out then but I feel a lot better about it

I watched some of the earlier footage and smiled as the youngsters were taking a real interest in happenings off the nest. Moving their head from left to right trying to focus. Was there a deer or two wandering thru the undergrowth.

Thank you Trevor for the explanation of Smolt 

The 18.22 fish was a 20 minute fish, despite it looking quite adequate. It seemed to have been fairly equally shared.
Asha was on the perch by 22.00hrs, The chicks took a while to settle but were lying down by 22.15 ready for the night. The grebe remains on the nest acting as pillow *** cushion, and underfoot as they all go about the day's activities.

11.00 Asha removes the unfortunate little grebe

28 July

No more fish last night.  Asha was already on the perch when darkness fell and was still there this morning, the deer may have been browsing beneath the nest:

She flew @ 04:52 and a couple of minutes later landed on the campost - where I think she stayed until 06:16, back to perch 06:40:

Back to campost via perch 07:29, away unseen 08:19, back a couple of minutes later with a couple of fistfuls, then a stick: 

Vigorous wingercising too near the edge for (my) comfort:

More sticks:

A fly-off:

Clump:

In the midst of a violent wingercise, IC2 (??? I have to do a refresher on this) landed right on the edge!

AFAICS... We still await a fish, even a sighting of Axel  

JillR said:

11.00 Asha removes the unfortunate little grebe

Thank you, JILL !!!