Home is where the heart is

We always get a warm glow as we finally board that ferry and begin the voyage home to Mull. It had been a long, stressful drive north on crowded motorways after a hectic fortnight of visiting family and friends in London and Wales. At one point trying to walk down Oxford Street with a great tidal wave of humanity coming in the opposite direction to us, we felt like we were about to be picked up and carried back the way we'd come. Progress was slow and thoughts of striding the empty hills of Mull kept flashing through my mind. London was fun for a day but it was like an alien habitat for us now. At least in Wales, we did find a nice mountain to climb - the Sugarloaf - with splendid views across the Brecon Beacons. Regular texts from Debby kept me in constant touch with how our sea eagle offspring were faring. At Loch Frisa, Heather was clearly doing just fine and I longed to see her up and about and flying strongly with Frisa and Skye. If only Bracken could be there too...

But of most concern to us all was how Half pint and her big sister were doing. They were the last eaglets to be still in the nest when I went away. All the others were safely on their way but their nest and eggs had been delayed this year by the atrocious weather back in March and April. In fact they were some 10 days later than normal. The text message while I was down south which told me the nest was now empty was a relief in some ways but also worrying. Eventually both chicks were heard but some days later only one chick was being seen. Visions of my discovery of Bracken and of a chick last year dead under their nest trees flooded back. Needless to say, Half pint's nest was first on my list to check after unpacking the car and essential things like picking up the guinea pigs and chickens from Debby!

On the first visit, sure enough, there was only one chick sitting in a tree nearby. Both parent birds keeping watch. Where was the second chick? They should all be together. Finally yesterday, the heavy rain showers paused sufficiently long enough to enable me to get back out there to check once more. Once again, an adult on duty but this time no chicks and all was strangely quiet. No gulls alarm calling. Even the frantic oystercatcher didn't let out her usual explosion of alarm calls as I slipped and skidded my way across the seaweed covered rocks at low tide. The adult sea eagle just watched me go by, no sign of any alarm calls from her. I took my time along the shore line, stopping every few metres to scan the trees in the hope of finding the chicks perched there. Still nothing, still silence. Then I started to find feathers and down stuck to the tops of bog myrtle and sedge. The more I moved along the strandline, the more feathers there were. I started to be concerned as to what I was about to find. Until I discovered what could only be described as a grand eagle dining table! A large flat topped rock covered in prey remains of seaduck, shag, fulmar, gull...what a feast there had been. Clearly this is where the adults had been delivering prey to their newly fledged chicks. I think we all saw each other at almost the same time. There sitting on a rock some 50 metres away was one of the chicks looking big, sleek, smooth and strong. A little further on sat Half pint, now the same size but not quite with the same beefy, robust stature of her big sisiter. For a few seconds she kept peering down at large clumps of bladderwrack and grappling with them as if playfully attacking some future prey. What complete and utter joy to see them both, alive and well, after the long worrying months of incubation and hatching all those months ago. Both flew well and strongly a short distance along the coast and perched professionally as if they'd been doing it for ever. The adult - looking a bit moth-eaten now as her post-breeding moult sets in - came across, located them and circled once to be sure they were safe and then returned to her tree. They were well on their way. Half pint was now a full pint! Soon they would all be off across the Sound of Mull and our work would be done for now. On my way back, I glanced up at the battered and tilting nest which had worried us all so many times this season. It won't survive the winter that's for sure. I wonder where the adults will settle next year and where will Half pint be by then? We wish them all well in their next trials of life.

Dave Sexton RSPB Scotland Mull Officer