We have a fledging……well, one and a half fledglings! This morning at 10:08am, our eldest Osprey chick ‘5R0’ took flight for the first time. It had been building for a couple of days, but with no pre-warning, he just upped and left this morning, and flew to a near by tree. Then, just over an hour later at 11:14am, sibling ‘5H2’ also took to the air, but only made it as far as the perch thats above the main camera. Within an hour all 4 were back on the nest when a fish was delivered, but now that both have left the nest for a period of time, their courage and desire to spend time on the wing will grow each day, and we’ll start to see less and less of them on the nest. This coming week will probably see all 4 fledge, and the comings and goings to the nest will mainly be to sleep and to get fed. We won’t celebrate a successful season just yet as there’s stilla lot that could happen between now, and late August/early September which is when the youngsters are likely to leave, but today definitely heralds a significant milestone in this years story…..so keep watching the webcam this week for more exciting instalments!

Our Summer Safari this AM was busy too with 2 different Osprey, one that had a fish and drifted off high towards Middlebere, then male 022 caught a fish in the Wareham Channel and headed back to the nest. Both White-tailed Eagles were being really boring and just sat in a tree on the edge of the RSPB Arne shoreline for 3 hours! Still great to see though. A Peregrine was checking out the scrapes at Swineham, and then a Goshawk was being seen off by a Hobby over Hyde’s Heath. A Little Ringed Plover was on the Stilt Pools at Swineham and Brownsea held 5 Turnstone, 3 Dunlin, c40 Common Redshank, 1 Greenshank, c80 Sandwich Terns and c40 Common Terns. A juvenile Common Redstart was found in the west of the harbour suggesting relatively local fledging.

Osprey chick 5R0 fledging this morning