Glesni Lays Three Eggs and Clarach Finds a Boyfriend

Glesni Lays Three Eggs and Clarach Finds a Boyfriend

Three Eggs Here, and Clarach in Scotland

Glesni has laid three eggs this year.

The second came on 17th April and the third on the 20th. They were laid at just under three days apart, absolutely spot on for osprey egg production time.

Here's a video of the second egg being laid on Easter Monday:

And a video of the third egg three days later, including Monty seeing his clutch of three eggs for the first time:

Will Glesni lay a fourth egg? Around one in 20 clutches have a quadruple egg count and this is dependent, probably, on the condition of the female, the date both birds return (the earlier the better for four eggs), the food provisioning by the male and lack of disturbance from other ospreys.

So we have every chance this year. If it does happen, it will be very early tomorrow (Sunday) morning.

 

Clarach

Our 2013 girl has moved on.

Usurped off a Rutland nest by a large Scottish female, Clarach flew north and a few days ago was spotted by Forestry Commission Scotland on their Aberfoyle nest. And the best news, she's still there three days later with a male that's bringing fish back for her.

© Forestry Commission Scotland. Clarach.

Clarach. © Forestry Commission Scotland

Clarach's new male friend is an unringed bird, so we don't know where he is from, but is almost certainly a Scottish bird, and most probably from around the Aberfoyle area.

Forestry Commission Scotland - Clarach and unringed male, Scotland April 2017

Clarach, unringed male. © Forestry Commission Scotland

Many thanks to the lovely Nik Cox and Forestry Commission Scotland for the images.

And Finally

A big thank you to all our volunteers who have so readily and again this year helped with filling our 24hr Protection and Surveillance rota for seven long weeks. Hard and underrated work.

 While Monty sleeps, we are not

© MWT - Monty April 2017

Monty. © MWT

The fact that Clarach is settling down in Scotland and is not an egg in an illegal egg collection somewhere is testament to your hard work over the years.

Thank you.