It's 7pm Sunday and as I type, Mallachie has not yet fledged the nest, so you haven't missed anything major.
However, late morning today, after 30+hours of non-stop rain of varying intensity, it finally stopped. It dried up a bit, the sun came out, it got warmer and a fairly stiff breeze got up too. I don't mean to taunt you given that you still cannot see what is going on, but I'm afraid that these would now make for perfect conditions for fledging, given that Mallachie is probably overdue to take the plunge, having been kept firmly rooted to the nest by the atrocious wet weather this weekend. If these conditions persist this evening she just might do it, but if not, then I reckon it will be tomorrow if it stays fair, as I feel she is ready to go.
At intervals today she spent time vigourously flapping her wings, and had she not been firmly gripping the nesting material at the nest-edge, effectively holding her down, she would have been up, up and away. I don't need to tell you that the webcam is still down, but we will strive to have it functioning tomorrow morning, hoping to beat Mallachie in the race againt time before she fledges.
Meantime, at the nest today, Rothes was absent for about an hour and half, no-doubt off somewhere exploring, enjoying her new-found freedom and independence and honing those flying and soaring skills. She will not have gone far, and was soon back when she got hungry.
At 6pm I phoned the Centre to see how the day had been. Ian reported that at that point three fish had been brought in, including what he described to me as another "whale" brought in by EJ. Whenever she goes out to fish, to help provision the family, she does seem to return with whoppers, far bigger fish than Odin catches. He too has brought in some good sized fish this season, but nothing that compares to the whale-sized offerings from EJ. Why is this? With the webcan being down, what now follows is another of those Cliff-singing-at-Wimbledon moments, to keep you informed and interested in what's going on at a time when you cannot see what's happening.
The simple reason why EJ catches and returns with bigger fish than him is because she is a bigger, more powerful bird than he is, and so able to carry a heavier payload than he possibly could. It's not just these two, all female ospreys are bigger than males. In fact virtually all female birds of prey of whatever species are bigger than their male couterparts. This is true for four out of the five bird of prey families in the world, with just one exception, whereas in all other bird families world-wide the males are either the bigger bird or are the same size. Only in raptors (plus owls & skuas - also predators) does this occur. It is called reversed size dimorphism (size difference).
So what's all that about then? Well, it is an adaptation to their raptorial lifestyle, linked to diet. Male raptors are smaller than females because by being smaller they can supply frequent meals for the females and young - a case of little & often, if you like, because males specialise in smaller prey items, which are generally more abundant in the environment as species and as individuals, than are larger prey items, be they mammals, insects, birds or, in the osprey's case, fish. Later in the season, females by being larger can supplement the efforts of males at a time when the growing family need all the more food the most. This coincides with a time when females can leave the well-grown young unattended and so freeing them up to lend a hand to raise the family. Being larger more powerful birds, they can drawn upon prey from a wider size spectrum - larger fish in EJ's case, catching fish that are too large and heavy for Odin. Hence the "whales" she has been returning with.
Larger female size in raptors confers other advantages too, in theory. Larger size means dominance, this helps promote successful pair formation, helps secure prey items from the males by making them surrender food, it helps prevent males potentially harming females and can help prevent males, accustomed to killing, from possibly killing their own young (not known in ospreys, I don't think). If you watched the goshawks on Springwatch you might have picked up on Simon King saying that the male goshawk is often afraid of his much larger female, barely visiting the nest, and if he does, he does so very briefly before getting out of there, fast.
Interestingly, in raptors, seemingly the faster and larger the prey, the greater the extent of this reversed size dimorphism. In vultures that eat dead things (carrion) - which doesn't move (!) the males and females are virtually the same size. Yet in some of the hawks and falcons, who prey on other birds which are clearly faster moving prey than carrion, the size difference between males and females is all the more marked, like the goshawks for example.
Anyway, enough for now. Hope that keeps you informed, interested and curious. And once again, sorry for the lack of pictures from our osprey nest, but rest assured that all's well.