What can we say…it’s not often two majorly exciting events of this magnitude take place on the same day. First and foremost we’re thrilled to announce that our 14 Osprey chicks for this years translocation safely arrived this afternoon at midday and were quickly placed into their new 5 star luxury pens at a secret location within the harbour where our team will now feed and monitor them for 2-3 weeks before releasing them again back out into the harbour. We’d like to say a huge thank you to numerous folk including Jason Fathers at Wildlife Windows who put in place all the infrastructure for the project which was quite a task we can tell you! Poole based fresh fish supplier Seafresh who have again kindly agreed to supply fish to our project to make sure the birds get the best possible start here in Poole. Also Roy Dennis and Tim Mackrill from the Roy Dennis Wildlife Foundation who were up in Scotland collecting the birds and Emily Joachim and Brittany Maxted who fed and cared for the birds whilst they were being collected. A huge thanks to those members of the public too who have supported either via donations towards the project or have sent us really kind emails of support. With 14 new birds its going to be one hell of a season but we have a great team behind us so we look forward to updating you on the project along the way. Here is the press release we sent out today which gives a fuller overview of the project – READ HERE.

Waders are still making up the bulk of the sightings with 6 Grey Plover, 2 Spotted Redshank, 3 Greenshank and 58 Black-tailed Godwit in Middlebere along with 2 Spoonbill and a fly over Great White Egret. On the Brownsea Lagoon there were 4+ Greenshank, the first returning Knot of the autumn, 1 Little Ringed Plover and a new pair of Avocet with a chick…how long will it last though? On Lytchett Fields 18 Green Sandpiper were spread across the site as were 9 Greenshank, 2 Common Sandpiper and the 1^st Snipe of the autumn back on site. Near Wytch 2 adult Redstart were seen but it’s unclear whether they were early migrants or local breeders.

Oh yeah, the second majorly exciting event to take place today…a certain Football Match. Its all too much!

Osprey chick 006 being placed into its new pen by Tim Mackrill