Bird Cams Around the World

Ringing, tagging and poo-ing!
richard thaxton
30 Jun 2014 11:33 AM

As by now you are no-doubt aware, on Saturday evening we leg-ringed and satellite tagged our young ospreys here at Loch Garten.

If only you knew what an anxious time it has been. Well you're about to know, because I shall tell you. Tagging was looking a bit touch & go there for a while. The tags only arrived on Friday at 5pm. Though ordered from USA in good time, entered into the Company's production schedule, and we had assurances that they would be here by mid-June, when I got back from leave on Monday 23rd June there was no sign of them!

I immediately e-mailed the US to enquire as to their whereabouts to be told that they had not yet been shipped! They were promptly shipped the next day, but with a likely 6 day delivery schedule it was looking like they wouldn't arrive until 1-2 July. Even then, that could just mean that they had arrived in Blighty but were sat at Stanstead Airport or some such, but had not been released by HMC until any duties had been paid. After a few phone calls I was assured that they would be with us here by 6pm on Monday 30th June. That would have made things very tight time-wise as the birds were already beginning to flap about, plus if we then happened to get held up by inclement weather, as has happened before, tagging could be in jeopardy. Panic hadn't quite fully set in, but we were getting worried about getting the tagging done. However at 5pm on Friday 27th June they arrived, giving us options and some leeway. Phew!

Once on the ground, the younger, smaller chick was fitted with a metal BTO ring.......

It was only our intention to tag two of the brood of three, choosing the bigger of the two. The smaller of the brood would, in any case have been that bit less advanced in its growth and size to take a tag, and if we waited for it to catch up, chicks one and two would or could be that bit closer to fledging. So all there young ospreys were brought down from the nest. The smallest was weighed, measured and leg-ringed then promptly put back in the nest. This would help reassure EJ circling high overhead. The other two were taken back to the Osprey Centre to be fitted with their bling.

Back at the Centre, the tagging went well. All three were found to be in good condition. Checks were made for "checks" in the feather growth, lines that indicate days of less food being provided and there very little sign of this, Odin, the boy done good, in providing plenty of fish, so far.

Roy demonstrated this and other checks made on the birds to those assembled Below he shows the blood-filled feather sheaths of the growing tail feathers.

And the details are as follows:

Chick 1 (longer in the wing and the tail at this stage, though a bit lighter than chick 2)
Sat Tag No. 139178
Colour ring AN0 (left leg)
Metal ring 141072
Wing 364mm
Tail 162mm
Weight 1720g

Chick 2
Sat Tag No. 139177
Colour ring AN9 (left leg)
Metal ring 140601
Wing 348mm
Tail 136mm
Weight 1885g

Chick 3
Colour ring AN8 (left leg)
Metal ring 1410670
Wing 302mm
Tail 110mm
Weight 1690g

The names? Well, there are two significant events that we wanted the names to celebrate.
All being well, the first of these three to fledge the nest will be the 100th osprey to do so from the Loch Garten nest - a hugely successful milestone in the osprey's story here. So we toyed and conjured with 100-type relevant names including Century, Centurion, Furmium (100th element in the Priodic Table!) and also derivations from Cent (as in 100). Had the largest chick been deemed male then we might have run with VinCENT, get it? But as it was a girl we've opted for Millicent (AN0), henceforth Millie for short, no doubt.

To mark 2014 being the 60th anniversary of the osprey's return to Scotland in 1954, the name of the second chick is the Gaelic word for 60, Seasca (AN9). The third, smallest chick, ringed but not satellite tagged has been names Druie (AN8) as in the River Druie which flows through the Rothiemurchus fish farm from whence no doubt most of their nourishment has been purloined!
It'll be just our luck eh, if Seasca now goes and fledges before Millicent?! Hey-ho.