This thread has been set up to follow the travels of Caledonia and Alba, the young ospreys raised at Loch Garten in 2012.
Their mother is “EJ”, the resident female at Loch Garten since 2003; there is some doubt about the identity of their biological father, given EJ’s dalliance with a male from a neighbouring nest, Blue XD, both before and after the return of her regular partner Odin, who raised them.
Caledonia hatched on 16th May and Alba on 18th May; they both fledged on 14th July.
This is a link to the Loch Garten blog describing the ringing and satellite tagging.
Caledonia’s ring is Blue/White AA1, reading downwards. Alba’s is Blue/White AA2, reading upwards.
Following the tracking
This page gives a quick overview of the routes on a map, which will be more useful once they start migrating.
If you want to look at the routes in more detail on Google Earth, this page contains instructions on setting up your PC to do this.
This blog contains some useful information about how the tracking works – we are now on a 3-day reporting period.
Very, very, very bad news about Alba after finding the almost perfect location so quickly, it seems there are no safe areas for young ospreys in West Africa. LG ospreys must be jinxed as we seem to have no end of bad luck with them whereas Rutland have a better than average return rate. I cant work out a logical reason for this.
Even though I tried to distance myself from Alba after what happend to chick#3... once she and Caledonia grew into fine young juvies I had my heart stolen once again! and now it's breaking, I just hope for the best now with Caledonia, and that she stays where she is safe, (as far as we know) and stays out of Africa ... and its dangers. I just hope Alba didn't suffer for too long however she died. :.o(
http://scottishwildlifetrust.org.uk/things-to-do/wildlife-webcams/loch-of-lowes/
so so sad. poor alba. such a fiesty lady. makes me wonder what it will take for us to be lucky enough to see a juvenile return to LG.
Such a shame - my first thoughts were with the Schoolchildren who had named both Caledonia and Alba, and who must be disappointed now with such an outcome. I agree that she seemed to be such a chip off the block, such an obvious offspring of the fiesty and wonderful EJ, and I had hopes that both of them would be part of a new dynasty to carry on EJ's genes into the future.
Such sad news all and I also thought if any could make it back Alba would but was sadly wrong.
RIP dear Alba.
Sad to hear the news about Alba, just hoping now that Caledonia stays safe and returns to LG in the future.
Sad to hear that Alba is no more but that is just what we were expecting after the sudden lack of data. The data was not so much missing as witheld.
Maybe it is time to look for the answer to the question of when a Loch Garten chick did return. I do know that one of the chicks from the 1991 nest did but I guess there must be one since then.
It would be good to know whether Baldrick was spotted but Loch Garten did not comment on that. Maybe now is the time to ask.
Tiger Signature
Such heartbraking news about Alba, I think we all had high hopes for her as she was so feisty. Now we have to hope and pray that Caledonia doesn't move from Spain and stays safe.
EJ's Memorial Balgavies Loch Ospreys 2023
Mary I will be keeping everything crossed for Caledonia in Spain. Please let her return safely to LG.
seagull0703 said: Mary I will be keeping everything crossed for Caledonia in Spain. Please let her return safely to LG.
Its all we can hope for now Seagull.