Report information
23rd April
Logie was still at her overnight roost at 5am but an hour later was circling over the Pass of Killiecrankie in Perthshire, which is 14 kilometres from her roost. At 7am she was over the central Cairngorms, flying N at 100km/h over Beinn Chaorainn just SE of Cairngorm, at an altitude of 1484 metres. This is the latest signal received.
Once the signals came in early this morning, we went to Logie's nest and found four ospreys circling and skirmishing over the site - she had arrived just as we did. After checking the birds with my binoculars, I suddenly saw the distinctive short radio aerial and identified Logie positively - here she was back home after her epic journey - to the exact tree she left on 4th August last year.
There then followed a period of continual skirmishing - Logie, the 'new' female and the male tried landing on the nest - and sometimes talons flashed between the two females. Logie looked fit although her plumage was quite faded from the glare of the African sun. Just as well because there was no way the male was going to feed her in this excitement. Sometimes even a third female joined in at aerial circling - often all three birds would drift away high in the shy and then return. Logie did show real ownership several times when she landed in the nest, crouching down with spread wings and trying to frighten off the intruder female, but once or twice even her mate dive-bombed her and sent her packing.
I will be back during the day and it may take several days to sort out the hierarchy at the nest - will Logie regain her nest and mate, or will she have to find new ones?
Later the signals came in and showed that Logie was in continuous flight all morning until at least midday - usually within 600 metres of her nest. Finally at 1pm the signals showed she was perched on her nest, and this was also the situation at 2pm, 3pm and 4pm, so she had won back her nest. But what an extra effort after flying back all that way; it shows the advantages for adults to be back early. Now she needs to build up condition to lay eggs, and at 9pm she looked well fed (her crop was full), so her mate must have caught an evening fish.
24th April
At 8.25am, Logie was standing firmly in her nest, scanning the skies for her mate. His job is to catch fish and bring them to the nest; her task is to protect the nest and, once she has laid eggs in a week or so, to carry out the bulk of incubation, while the male catches fish. It will take another day or two to be certain all is normal. The intruder female has been seen off but she has spent a week hoping to claim this nest and mate, and now she has to go off and find a new place - a metal ring (and no colour ring) suggests to me she is an older osprey who may have lost a mate, or who may have been waiting for her mate to return. Hopefully the latter, as yesterday saw more ospreys arriving in Scotland in what is a very late spring arrival. If I find her nesting, I will include that news in this log.
Now that Logie is home, I will update this page occasionally with key happenings - when she lays eggs, when her eggs hatch, how many young there are - and then in mid August, assuming everything goes as planned in osprey lives, we will follow her migration back to Africa on a daily basis - she will probably leave later than last year because of her delay, but will she stop over in the Solway? Will she follow the same route back as she did last year? What pitfalls will she encounter on the way back, and will she winter on the same island? We may even try to follow her by land and air on that journey back!! Either way, we'll definitely follow her progress here.
Her migration from West Africa lasted 43 days and she flew at least 3619 miles (5803 kilometres) in 27 days of active migration; she also spent 16 days waiting out the bad weather. Her best day's flight was 215 miles, and her shortest just 26 miles.
Further Reading:
Next report: Logie has chicks
Last report: Logie back in Scotland
You can see the whole journal at Roy Dennis' Migration Diary.