The buzzard's tale - the call of the wild

Weekend sat tag update:

As hoped our male sea eagle juvenile Mara has popped up with a good signal on 4 December. At 0723, as dawn was beginning to break, he was a few miles west of Tobermory in the north west of Mull not far from Glengorm castle. That is probably where he spent the previous night (in a Sitka spruce plantation not as B&B in Glengorm Castle which is very nice but he prefers to roost in trees). I'm heading east to the snowy Cairngorms this weekend so more blog updates next week.

Back at Wings over Mull, the poorly buzzard was stabilised and his wounds dressed. He was kept snug and warm overnight before Sue could get him on the ferry to see the vet in Oban. Despite the ferry being booked up, CalMac did their best as usual; they moved things around, found a cancellation and managed to squeeze the car on carrying its precious cargo.

The amazing vet in Oban was well used to Sue arriving with injured birds of prey and he gave his time freely. After x-rays, an hour long operation where the vet used techniques usually applied to eye surgery, he administered anti-biotics and then bandaging to hold the damaged wing in place. Once he had recovered sufficiently well to be moved again, he was allowed home into the care of Wings over Mull.

And there he stayed for eight long weeks, day by day getting stronger and stronger. They kept all human contact to a bare minimum apart from occasionally redressing his healing wound. Amazingly the x-ray showed he had not broken his wing despite dangling and twisting on the metal spike for so long. Everytime I visited I would nervously ask how he was, always knowing how quickly sensitive birds of prey can suddenly take a nose dive after looking like they're improving. But everytime, Sue would respond with a smile and a 'he's still with us and doing well'.

Occasionally I was allowed a sneaky peek at him through the spyhole and the sight which greeted me filled me with hope and reassurance. There he was now sitting upright like a proper buzzard, his bandages off and he was holding his wing in place. In front of him were the remains of his last meal which he'd devoured with gusto.

His strength was returning rapidly now. Occasionally he could be heard calling to his wild cousins outside who would answer back, never quite knowing where the call was coming from. And most importantly he was trying to exercise his wings again which was the best sign of all. It was time to move to the next stage.

We all continued to believe that one day he would be returned to the wild where he belonged but to do that he would need to be transferred to a bigger aviary where he could build up his flight muscles again and get his geography sorted. We needed a suitable release site and it wasn't long before another farm at Crannich in Glen Aros, not far from his original territory came forward with an offer to site the release pens.

The building materials were purchased or donated and the large aviary was duly built by a small, hardworking team of volunteers including the island's police sergeant! Then, when the time was absolutely right and the vet had given him his final health check, the young buzzard was placed one night into his new temporary home. One step closer to freedom.

We can only imagine the senses and anticipation he experienced when, as dawn broke, he looked out through the mesh and for the first time in months could see the open hills and forests beyond. Food was sneakily positioned inside his aviary without him knowing where it came from. On some nights Sue slept in a tent on the hillside nearby to watch him at first light to see how he was behaving and when she was sure the time was right, the big day for the release finally arrived.

It had been a long journey for one unlucky but lucky buzzard on Mull. His recovery had involved an international corporation in BT, a major transport company in CalMac, the skills of a vet, farmers, Strathclyde Police, RSPB, volunteers and most of all the care and dedication of Wings over Mull. Was it really all worth it? Why devote so much energy and time for one common buzzard? Well, in a way, that's not the point because there isn't really a choice to be made in such circumstances.

People want to help when a fellow creature is in distress and they don't think twice about offering their services. It's one of the very good bits of human nature and we'd all be in a far sorrier state if it didn't exist. Some rescues are not successful of course but each case is different and although RSPB does not have the expertise to operate bird rescue centres ourselves we work closely with the SSPCA, RSPCA and other private centres who do so much good work for Britain's birds and other wildlife.

One bright morning in late summer, the fully recovered buzzard blinked in the dawn sunshine as he gazed about his enclosure. But something was different. There was no mesh holding him in any more. A window on a new world had been opened for him. He hesitated at first and jumped from perch to perch and then alighted on the threshold to freedom. With barely a moment's thought, he was away, out across the glen, flying strongly. He landed well in some trees and looked all around him to get his bearings. The young buzzard was home again. It had all been worth it. When everyone pulls together and with a little help from Mother Nature, great things can happen.

Footnote: items of food were put out for him for several weeks afterwards around the release cage which he readily took but he slowly weaned himself off that and started to catch his own prey again. He had a BTO ring on so was easily identifiable. As the weeks passed he was seen less and less and his prospects looked good. Whenever we drive up Glen Aros now, we see buzzards aplenty but rarely get a good long view of their legs to see if one is ringed. But whether any one of them is 'the' buzzard or indeed his offspring we may never know but we're sure he's out there somewhere soaring with the eagles over the mountains of Mull.

Dave Sexton RSPB Scotland Mull Officer