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Data's in - no change from either Mallachie or Rothes (as of 9pm and 6pm respectively yesterday the 22nd).

I'll update again tomorrow.

The data for today has now been input and there is still no change from either Mallachie or Rothes. I'm rather running out of ways of saying that. But they are both still moving around lots, just only over a small, localised area. The latest data point I have is for 2pm today (22nd) for Mallachie and 1pm for Rothes. Rothes was exploring the coast a bit at that point and Mallachie was at the reservoir north of Zebreira.

Apologies for the brevity of this post, but I've a rather busy day. More tomorrow.

Well the weather in France might have turned distinctly autumnal, but this hasn't convinced Rothes that it is time to move further south yet. I've just had a look at the data that my two short term resi vols spent the afternoon inputting (I'm writing that in case there are any glaring errors...!) and Rothes has stuck with where she knows. The latest point I have for her is 8am this morning (21st) when she was just off the coast about 2miles from her favoured roost/fishing site.

Meanwhile Mallachie spent the weekend switching between the two reservoirs, roosting at the one near Ladoeiro and then spending the day at the one north of Zebreira. As of 8am this morning she was still at the one near Ladoeiro.

I'll update you all again tomorrow - but now I must go to maintain the chainsaw I was using this morning...

I've added the new data - but only got one new point for Rothes - as of 5pm yesterday (17th) she was in the same place. I guess if the weather changes over the weekend she might start to move on - so it will be interesting to see on Monday.

Meanwhile Mallachie is also still sitting tight in Portugal, moving between the two reservoirs. The latest data I have for her is 3pm today (18th) and at that point she was at the reservoir north of Zebreira.

I'll not be able to check the data over the weekend - but hopefully you can all hang on until Monday afternoon. I'd do it earlier in the day but I've another residential volunteer starting on Monday and we like to make the most of them for some hard work while they're around!

Have a good weekend.

Well the data is updated, and neither Mallachie or Rothes have ventured very far in the last 24 hours.

Rothes spent most of yesterday afternoon over the waters of La Gironde before returning to her favoured spot to roost. As of 10am this morning (17th) that's where she still was. I don't know what the weather is like in France, but if it's anything like what we're getting here at Abernethy at the moment I wouldn't move on either.

Meanwhile Mallachie stayed at the reservoir north of Zebreira until after 4pm yesterday, and then returned to the one near Ladoeiro to roost. At 8am this morning she headed back up and as of 1pm today she was at that same reservoir north of Zebreira.

More tomorrow.

I'm writing this blog a bit earlier than usual as I need to head into Aviemore.

I've added the new data - up to 8am this morning (16th) for Mallachie and 10am for Rothes.

Rothes is sticking in the same place - with short exploratory flights - she headed west over La Gironde at 8am today, to return by 9am to her spot. It'll be interesting to she what she does tomorrow (and did since 10am this morning).

Meanwhile Mallachie is exploring her local area a bit - after roosting near Ladoeiro on 15th, she neaded back north past Zebreira to the other reservoir where she spent most of yesterday afternoon, before heading back to near Ladoeiro by 8pm to roost. At 8am this morning she was in a similar spot, not yet venturing far for the day.

More tomorrow.

Well I've just added the new data, and there isn't a great deal to report. As Rothes hasn't yet run out of fish (I'm assuming) she is (as of 9pm yesterday, 14th) still in her favoured spot - though she did head over to the coast briefly, to near Conac, before returning to roost in 'her spot'.

Mallachie is also still taking it easy, hanging around where we left her yesterday in Portugal, then taking a brief trip north yesterday afternoon (about 15km) up the N332 past Zebreira to visit another reservoir. She then returned to near Ladoeiro to roost (as of 9pm yesterday).

I'll update you all again tomorrow.

Apologies to those of you who might have thought the map didn't get updated on Friday - I entered the data (which showed no change from either Rothes or Mallachie), then went to write the blog, to find the Osprey team's fairwell messages. I didn't feel the no change message was really exciting enough to relegate that post off the top (so to speak) and so I didn't write one.

But it's a new week now and I've just finished inputting the latest data.

Rothes hasn't yet fininshed all the fish where she is and so has stayed put near Fontaine in France (at least up until 12noon today (14th).

Mallachie had a slightly busier weekend - flyinging over the border into Portugal at 4pm on 11th, though she returned to her Rio Tajo haunts until 2pm on 12th when she crossed into Portugal west of Monte Fidalgo. She flew west towards Perais and then mooched about until 12noon on 13th when she headed north towards Ladoeiro. As of 4pm yesterday (13th), the latest point I have, she was hanging around a reservoir south of the N240, east of Ladoeiro.

Meanwhile here at Abernethy it's a fantastic afternoon and so I'm off out to enjoy it. More tomorrow.

Well as I type Malcolm is hoovering, Debbie is cleaning the feeders and Ian is cleaning the toilets, its definately the end of the season, no osprey to look at out of the flaps anymore!  We have had plenty to watch whilst we have been packing up the centre, red squirrels, woodpeckers, and even a sparrowhawk yesterday lunchtime!  We shall not be heading to Africa, to enjoy the winter sun and watch osprey, but we shall be able, like you to at least keep up with Rothes and Mallachie on-line.  I wonder what excitement and dramas 2010 will bring, will EJ be back, will Odin be back to Loch Garten, will White TF challenge for the nest in 2010?  So many questions and so much to look forward to.  Thanks for all the cakes, biscuits and drinks over season, and it has been great to put a face to some of your names.  We await the next fish.....although I anticipate that we might be waiting rather a long time....so in the meantime I shall get the others to write their goodbyes!  Thanks again Claire

I have really enjoyed getting to know our intrepid ospreys this year!  Plus, I finish with good memories of the team, volunteers, visitors and our 'big green and blue office'.  My next few months will involve hopefully getting into the mountains here on my doorstep, shop work and wildlife watching. ...And keeping an eye on Rothes and Mallachie (and Richard!).  Malcolm.

Don't worry, we haven't cleaned (and removed) all of the bird/squirrel feeders! In fact, you may have noticed the brilliant new model Richard has installed for the winter! It's been really amazing to work here this season, watching the ospreys and sharing their antics with everyone that's visited. Great to meet all the bloggers that made it here! Thank you so much for all the goodies, although I need a diet now! My fellow workers have all been great fun too, so thanks to them and, we woudn't have been anywhere without all of our volunteers being here, so thanks to them too. Good luck to our beautiful ospreys. Now there is only one thing left to do.......we must go out..... for final cake!!!!! Debbie.

Well 2010 seems a long way off at the moment, but if the next six months goes as quick as the last six months it hardly seems worth packing. Its been great talking to so many people about the ospreys and meeting so many bloggers and being able to put faces to names. So the last day is upon us and i will be watching our chicks progress on the internet with you, thanks to you all for adding to the fun this year and lets hope 2010 is just as good with three more chicks, now did Debbie say the magic word CAKE...!!! Ian.

So that is it, farewell from David too in his absense.  Have a great winter, so long and thanks for all the cake...

Oh, nearly forgot......if you're feeling bereft of ospreys, you can always defect to the Mull eagles blog to keep up to date with things there too, (we will not hold it against you, promise). For the first time ever, their hide is staying open all autumn as their birds, unlike our ospreys, are resident and still around to be seen, so it's still worth a visit. - Richard

I've just finished entering the latest satellite data for both Mallachie and Rothes. When the map updates (assuming I did it right!) Mallachie will be up to date until 8am this morning (9th) and Rothes will be up to date until 1pm today.

Neither of them have done anything dramatic in the last 24 hours. Rothes definitely doesn't seem to be in a hurry to move on from near Fontaine north of Bordeaux. As for Mallachie she's exploring the Rio Tajo area thoroughly travelling eastwards and westwards along the river system between Parque Nacional de Monfrague in Spain and Parque Natural do Tejo Internacional in Portugal. She might have crossed over the border into Portugal, but the satellite hasn't caught her at it yet.

As for me I've got to dash - a meeting about Goldeneye ducks in Aviemore tonight. Tune in tomorrow for another update.

Mallachie has moved on yet again.  She stayed near Tinosillos overnight on 7th September but next day, after having what appears to have been a long-lie, awaiting the heat of the day I suspect to aid her passage, she set off at 9am on a south westerly bearing towards San Vicente de Arevalo.  The thermals giving her lift up to between 800-1000m.

From these altitudes, Mallachie can presumably spot likely places to divert to, to stop and fish because by late morning, she had made good ground and at 11am had dropped in height to a lake or reservoir complex, east of Mirvena de los Infanzones.  A quick bite to eat perhaps (?), within the hour before the next fix, because at noon she was on her way again near to Piedrahito.  At 1pm she had located another lake near Quebrada de Serradilla and then by 2pm she was at the famous Parque Nacional de Monfrague, a place I have visited several times - a simply wonderful place for raptors, though when I have visited, I've never seen osprey there!  There is some good fishing for her there though, but she didn't stay long before heading along a river close to the border between Spain and Portugal in Parque Naturel do Tejo Internacional.  She's not hanging about, is she eh?  Unlike Rothes, who, yes you guessed it, is still holed-up in La Gironde north of Bordeaux.  Is she going to over-winter there perhaps?  Or could it be that her unusually very early departure from us here at Loch Garten, has taken it's toll on her and she just needs a lot of time to recuperate.

I've now checked on the data regime, and we should continue to get hourly fixes, which we will strive to up-date you on, on a daily basis, until 1st November when the regime changes to twice daily fixes and a weekly download. This change is in anticipation of the wintering grounds having been reached by then, but I'm not sure that will apply to Rothes though, the slouch. 

My colleague Alice will be taking over up-dating you for a while, starting tomorrow, as I head away for a wee break next week.  During the autumn winter, as well as keeping you informed of the osprey's whereabouts, we hope to broaden the blog a little and tell you about some of the wider work taking place here at Abernethy.  Readers last year will recall us doing this, but we hope to expand on that further this year, with news of our habitat management work progress, willdife sightings and anything else newsworthy.  Anyway, more on that anon.  Meantime over to Alice for a while.

Whilst her elder sister Rothes still lingers north of Bordeaux, Mallachie presses on.  She is now north west of Madrid, just west of a small town called Tinosillos, along the Rio Arevalillo river.  Her route to this, her most up to date position (7am this morning, 8th September), took her on a south westerly bearing from near Pamplona towards Logrono, then to Aranda de Duero where she appears to have picked up the course of the Rio Arevalillo.  Fishing en route perhps?  Good progress from her again, yet Rothes remains settled in La Gironde.

Packing up here continues (we're almost there),  but Malcolm called to say that he saw an osprey on site very briefly this morning.  No satellite tag aerial was seen, so presumabaly not the one of Roy Dennis' that was tracked to near us here on Sunday.  Is White TF playing games, was it him, again? 

As the dust begins to settle on our season just passed, I can report that our total visitor numbers this year, from opening on 1st April to closing on 6th September, topped 40,000, just.  40,114 in fact, 12.5% up on last season and only the second time in the past decade that have we passed the 40k mark.  Our thanks to any of you out there reading this, who visited, and we know that many of you did.  Similalry, our thanks to those of you out there who joined RSPB this season.  Some of you did so on-line, but here on site we signed up 560 new memberships this season, that's approximately 1,100 new members, supporting our work here at Loch Garten and throughout RSPB.  This has been a brilliant achievement by the team, who have worked hard at sharing their passion and enthusiasm for ospreys and other wildlife, with all our visitors, hopefully sparking & firing-up an interest and care for birds and the environment among many.  Many thanks indeed to all of you who have joined RSPB.  And to those of you who are not members, I would just say,  please do consider joining.  We need all the help we can get to support our invaluable & vital conservation work.  Thank you.

And finally............in this our 50th Golden Anniversary year of showing and sharing ospreys with people here at Loch Garten, we achieved a very fitting golden finale to our season.  On 4th August we were re-audited by VisitScotland for the Green Tourism Business Scheme and just days before closing for the season word came through that we had retained the award of the Gold standard in the scheme, for the third consecutive time, first in 2003, again in 2005 and now 2009.

I've asked Claire, David, Malcolm, Debbie and Ian - Team LG 2009 - to prepare a sign-off post for you later this week.

Firstly, sorry for not up-dating over the weekend.  I tried to, but the computers were glacial in their speed for some reason, so I gave up.  Anyway all's well now and there is a lot of news.

Where do I start?  Well, the computers might have been slow over the weekend but Mallachie certainly wasn't.  She's been tanking along, making great prgress.  She might have been the last to leave home, and even then reluctantly, but she has made up for lost time.  In short, she has now over taken her somewhat sedentary elder sister, Rothes, and Mallachie is now in Spain!!

On Friday 4th at 7am  she was east of Le Havre, Normandy.  She set off south and passed right by La Grande Mare Reserve Nationale Cynegetique a huge lake/wetland complex which would have been an ideal place to bide a while, but no, she pressed on determinedly.  She passed another wetland area at Cloyes at 1pm, crossing the River Loire at 3pm.  Her route took her passed yet more lakes near Chemery and yet she seemed not to stop.  However, as the satellite data gives hourly readings, whilst she appears to be on the move constantly, she could easily have stopped at any of these places to re-fuel on fish.  Mallachie then appears to have stopped to roost for the night at 9pm at Foret de Gatine - a wood with a lake in the middle of it - a perfect spot to rest, I'd say.

Mallachie's no slouch, by 5am on Saturday morning 5th September, she was on the move again, near Valencay, then at 10am she was at La Maloterie and an hour later she was near a place called Migre, which might be better named Lakes-ville.  Lakes everywhere in this area, so ample fishing opportunities for Mallachie to fill her boots.  At noon on Saturday she was east of La Trimouille, not far from Limoges.  In contrast to Mallachie's progress, Rothes has remained in La Gironde River, north of Bordeaux.  Limoges is not far off being at the same latitude as Bordeaux so Mallachie has caught up with her languishing sister.

Mallachie continued to move on; south of Montbron, then north of Bonnes, and then Chemin de Tire Merle, east of Bordeaux - quite close to her sister Rothes, but no comfy sturgeon farm for her, she continued south to Parc Naturel Regional des Landes where she did finally give herself a break and rest a while.  But was resting a good idea, I'm wondering?  She was doing so well.  Because at 10am yesterday Mallachie went west, (oh no!), out towards the washing machine that is the Bay of Biscay, the downfall of many a migrating bird.  As I tapped in the next co-ordinates, my hands had become noticebale shaky & clammy, but to my huge relief she had done a u-turn and was back over dry land by 11am.  At 12 noon Mallachie was south of Port d' Albert then at 1pm, worryingly she went back towards the Bay of Biscay again!!!  What was going on?  Is there some sort of mysterious Bermuda Triangle-type pull out there?  Anyway by 2pm she was back over land again at Ciboure, where she was photographed.  Our thanks to Didier Domec for these fantastic pictures.  It's her right enough.  Nice to see her.

Mallachie then moved further south away from the coast and further in land, crossing into Spain, passing west of Igantzi at 3pm, near Ezkurra at 4pm and our last fix for her to-date is west of Pamplona at 5pm.  Phew!  A few slight scares in that lot, but safely overland now with the Bay of Biscay behind her.

Here on site, we haven't seen an osprey for almost three days, White TF having now gone ( I've said that before).  The last of our trusty volunteers completed the last shift of the season on Friday night and they departed on Saturday.  Our sincere thanks to them and indeed all our volunteers who have helped us here at Loch Garten this season, some bloggers amongst them. 

It was a shame though that we didn't have volunteers for just a couple of days more, because today we had a call from Roy Dennis to say that a bird he satellite tagged elsewhere here in Strathspey, made a day trip all the way across to Aberdeenshire yesterday, and then by evening it had returned to within 700m of the Loch Garten nest!  Roy was asking whether the evening shift of volunteers had seen it, but there was no-one there.  We have been on site all morning today, taking down cameras, removing some of the nest material (including yet another piece of fishing line, complete with hook) but we saw no sign of any ospreys.

We closed yesterday so the season is now done and dusted. Just some final packing up bits & pieces to do. The nest camera has been removed and the live-streaming imaging has now switched to the red squirrel feeder-cam for the winter. 

Great news, Mallachie has made a successful channel crossing, phew! 

She left HM Prison Hewell yesterday morning at 5am and made tremendous progress.  She dropped down through Worcestershire, through Gloucestershire in to Hampshire, out over The Solent to Isle of Wight then headed out to sea, making for the French coast.

Her route was approximately as follows; Fackenham, Bishampton, Southam north of Cheltenham, Kemble south west of Cirencester, West Kennett, Totton in Hampshire, Brading on the I.o.W - (new RSPB reserve there), then out over the sea at 3pm yesterday.  Her crossing took her a couple of hours until she reached the Normandy coast of France.  She roosted last night near a place called Fonguesemare, but was on the move again at 5am this morning, the last fix on her that we have for now.

It is a relief to know that she has safely made her first serious sea-crossing and reached France.  Perhaps she will now progress down towards Bordeaux and meet up with Rothes. Now that would be amazing.  We shall see.  Talking of Rothes, yes she is still in the same general area, La Gironde.  She has made a few trips out - across the river and back, back down to that nuclear power station again, yet always returning to Dr Jones' sturgeon farm to roost.

Here on site, having said yesterday that White TF had gone, well he was back again this morning, seen by the trickle of visitors that we are still getting amidst packing up the Centre an' all.  In answer to your collective questions from your blog comments;  yes it is all a bit bleak here right now. The packing up is all a bit sombre, so White TF's re-appearance lifted us a bit. The weather is horrible with 36 hours of non-stop rain, causing localised flooding in the area and, with all the dampness, the midges are absolutely hellish.  However we all went out for an end-of-season meal last night and a jolly good time was had by all. The blog page will continue even after we have closed.  Alice and I will be doing it.  We will get daily data on the birds until sometime in October, by which time we hope they will have reached their winter quarters in West Africa somewhere. After which, the data will become weekly.  And the final answer to a question in the comments - yes I do have to the toilets at some point!  Compost anyone?  It would make good grow-bag content. Perhaps we should consider a buy-your-own-back scheme!  Hmmm, maybe not.

There's a tinge of sadness amongst the team today, as David Anderson leaves us tonight.  He's away to a new post, working at Gartmorn Dam in Clackmannanshire. It is a council run nature reserve with important populations of over-wintering wildfowl. The RSPB are in partnership with Clackmannanshire Council to run a project there over the winter months. His contract is for five months so he will be there until the end of January. So we say goodbye and good luck to David and our many thanks to him for all his efforts at Loch Garten this season. The rest of the team are here with me until next Friday.

Mallachie's latest movements should up-date on the map later this evening but I've run out of road today now, so have not up-dated Rothes movements, which are only very slight anyway.

Have a good weekend.

Rothes remains at/around the sturgeon farm, north of Bordeaux, France. She seems to have had a lazy day down there, not moving very much, just biding her time pottering about between 6am and 9pm yesterday.  There was a gap in the data though, between 1pm and 8pm, so perhaps she popped off to the river in that time.

Yesterday's data showed Mallachie to be over Birmingham at 1pm.  The latest data just in, shows her to have carried on going, over M42 at Lickey, Worcestershire at 2pm, Bromsgrove Golf Centre at 5pm, passing Pikes Pool Lane, Tutnall at 6pm and then she made an evening visit to Hewell HM Prison, near Tardebigge, north east of Redditch.  There seems to be large lake either in the grounds or just next door and the last fix at 9pm last night, suggests that she roosted there at Her Majesty's pleasure.

Here on site we are in the throes of packing up, though still open to visitors until Sunday 6th.  No osprey sightings for a while now.  So it looks like White TF has gone now too.  Heavy rain all day today and cold with it too, so all rather miserable here today.