LOCH GARTEN - April 2024

(I am starting a new thread for April because, for sad personal reasons, Korky cannot be with us until further notice so the March title cannot be edited.)

Please read Korky's comprehensive March 2024 intro.

Asha and Brodie

Last year they arrived on 04 and 14 April respectively.

The end of the 2023 season was marred by the aggressive intrusion of BlueKL5 "Klive" (thank you, Fergus).  We have no idea if the 2 youngsters were fit to migrate.

We haven't heard anything from HQ but it appears that the cams are not quite ready, despite snaps being posted to Facebook 10 days ago together with a query about the lack of IR for the third year in a row - and the streaming is unsteady and unreliable.  When LG issued a warning about a delay to the opening of the season, it seemed to refer only to the Visitor Centre.

  

The PTZ now

Quote RSPB YT Channel: When the Loch Garten Nature Centre opens on April 15th, this camera is controlled by the centre staff during work hours, so please be gracious if you find it staring at an empty tree! The birds react quicker than the staff are sometimes able.

IMAGICAT

  • Brodie is definitely a morning kind of guy Slight smile

  • I should have said that all this analysis has been done from the LG pairs because of the dedicated volunteers keeping the entries in their log books so religiously for over 50 years. A dream for a statistician like me. Hats off to these literally 1000s of volunteers!  Now replaced by us continuing in the same tradition!

  • .

    I've seen Brodie bring back the same fish getting smaller and smaller, but not seen a changeover - so I must have missed it.  Will do a thorough check later.

    Nice to see the weather clear up for dear Asha.

    IMAGICAT

  • Hi    Take a look at my post from earlier today.  Brodie caught the fish at 10:53 and tried twice to get Asha to eat it but she declined.  He finally finished it off himself.

  • .

    Very sorry, EJFan, I missed your egg alert, only noticing Richard's supersnap at the time!

    EJFan said:

    I think we may have an egg! About 10.45 i think I spotted one!

    However, I'm still mulling over the relative intelligence of Henry -vs- the unnamed male who adopted and raised 3 children without the laborious pre-period of nest-building, courting and fishing - he was obviously more management-grade, a delegator Grin  Yes, I do know that genetics come into it and he missed out that year.

    I've PM'd you this morning Kissing heart

    IMAGICAT

  • Not a problem dear lady! The news reporter is much more inferior than the news itself!

    replied to your PM!

  • While I think about it… I think it was on the camera chat that someone mentioned that they would like to see the male feed the chicks. This is extremely rare behaviour. It was first seen at this nest in July 1993 when the female flew from the nest entangled in fishing line and never returned. The male was forced to feed the chicks himself, but the chicks were already quite a size. As far as I am aware it was not seen again until 2004 when Henry was observed on a number of occasions feeding the very small chicks.

    I mentioned this during a chat I had with Alan Poole and he was astonished.. he had never observed this behaviour in any of the 1000s of nests he has monitored in the States.

    one of our volunteers firmly believed that Henry was well in touch with his feminine side. 
    as a matter of interest did Odin ever exhibit this behaviour?

  •   is there record of whether the 1993 chicks survived and fledged? 

  • scylla said:
    not seen a changeover - so I must have missed it.

    Yes I did miss it, and here it is/was.  As noted at the end of the video (in case anyone can't stay the course to see caption at the end, but of course that won't actually apply to anyone here Stuck out tongue winking eye )... the longest uninterrupted "sit" I found was about 4m30s - no other sitting came close to that!

    IMAGICAT

  • Freebird - 2 eggs hatched that year and both successfully fledged after the male - Ollie - took over the duties of both .parents!