The weather this week at Loch Garten could best be described as inclement! Wind has been an ever-present factor throughout the week, with sunshine and showers in more or less equal amounts, and even snow on the high tops!
However, Odin has not let this faze him, bringing back two fish on Thursday, three yesterday (although he ate the first small one himself!) and one already today! This is a very impressive total, as fishing will not have been easy - the high winds make the surface of the water choppy and therefore more difficult for the osprey to spot the fish, whilst the added combination of the current cold temperatures causes the fish to go deeper in the water. So Odin continues to live up to his name!
EJ has been experiencing some long incubation stints, as Odin has often had to spend a good few hours away from the nest catching the fish. She has experienced the brunt of the weather this past week, keeping a firm seat on the nest no matter what. Thankfully, she has not had to endure anything quite as severe as the thunderstorm that we experienced last year the week before the first egg hatched! We are more than half way through the incubation period now, so we are all getting very excited here at the Centre!
We have had a couple of singleton osprey fly past the nest in the past couple of days, but Odin and EJ have given them short shrift, and sent them on their way. There have been several crows in the area too, but Odin has obviously made an impression, as one that was sitting on the camera tree at 7.45 this morning took flight as soon as it saw Odin return!
We await the next fish...