THE osprey family at nest 2 continue to thrive despite mother nature bringing its worse summer weather experience for the growing youngsters.

During a brief respite from the rain on July 8, the family came under some intense pressure from disturbance of the avian kind.

Something was circling the nest from early morning through to mid afternoon over prolonged periods which sent Mrs O into super protective mode.

Her partner FKO could be heard close by also emitting high pitched alarm calls but all we could detect from the camera was a large shadow of a bird occasionally over the nest or circling around it.

It made no attempt to land or come closer but it posed a threat and seemed to not be the usual nosey osprey passing and checking out another site.

Hopefully it has moved on, we lost Sacha 2E2 a couple of days after fledging last year, so we do hope that this is not something (goshawk or buzzard) stalking the young birds waiting for a chance to pounce when they fledge.

The next day it was back to rain and no further skyward threats and it was good to see that FKO was still managing to bring fish in to feed the family even though they were only quite small trout.

Recently we received reports that a Tweed Valley bird 697 had been seen in Ripon, Yorkshire, checking out a nesting platform and this week we had more news of another Tweed Valley two-year-old male, 722 in the same area.

Matthew Cormack kindly sent us some information and photographs and said that he appeared on July 4 at 12.15pm.

Matthew said: ‘He appeared for a brief period above Flask Lake at its western edge, dived towards it with no result (I couldn’t tell if it broke the water for a fish) and then circled a little longer before disappearing southwards. A couple nearby also saw it and apparently spotted it on the nest platform just before I saw it in flight.’

722 is from a brood of three males which were raised by parents FS2 and Oscar (un-ringed male) in 2022.

All three so far have been spotted since fledging which is a good record. Brothers 720 in Dyfed and 721 in Gambia earlier this year.

A very successful nest was visited for ringing the chicks on July 9.

The un-ringed parents at this site have successfully raised FKO (Mrs O’s partner at nest 2) in 2014, PW3 in 2016 (Mrs O’s former partner at the main nest) and CN5 in 2013 (nesting in Dumfriesshire).

(Assuming it is the same parents at the nest which cannot be confirmed but all fledged from this site).

CN5 was recently rescued from entanglement in fishing netting in Dumfriesshire and having damaged his foot has been taken to SSPCA Fishcross to hopefully recover. Sadly, he will likely have a family somewhere nearby that he is now unable to provide for.

He was originally from a brood of three ospreys where he was raised with his brother CN7 and sister CN6 in 2013.

This year at this nest site, they have raised a brood of two healthy chicks and under licence were fitted with darvic rings and BTO rings.

Blue 6J6, a female and 6J7, a male, the gender was determined at the time of ringing and was based on biometric data measurements.

Two of the Tweed Valley nest sites have moved location, the birds may have found that their previous sites had blown out during winter months and so relocated to another site.

One of which was visited on July 9 by the Forestry and Land Scotland Environment team and the three chicks present were ringed.

They were a little smaller than the two ringed earlier in the day but all three were given a clean bill of health and were fitted with darvic rings 6J3, 6J4 and 6J5 and their smaller size biometrics indicated that they were likely all males.