IT'S Osprey time of year again. From April onwards, these magnificent birds can be seen around here as they return from their African winter haunts to breed in the UK, where the climate is cooler and the fishing is good.
In Wales, the RSPB manages an osprey viewing project at Pont Croesor near Porthmadog. For three years now, a pair of Ospreys has returned from Africa to breed at this site, and the RSPB has set up a viewing station to help people get a great view of these awesome birds.
To help things along a little, an artificial nest has been set up, actually a basket about 4ft square fixed firmly into a suitable tree, which is cleared out by volunteers each year to allow the Ospreys to build themselves a fresh nest for the season.
The nest site itself is kept under human surveillance to ensure the birds are not disturbed, while a CCTV camera feeds live footage to the visitor Centre a safe distance away.
Telescopes are trained on the tree, and if, like me, your timing is good, you may be lucky enough to see one of the birds returning to the nest from a fishing trip.
The heat haze (yes, even North Wales suffers from heat haze on a good day) can mean that the image through the scope is a little wobbly, so for the best close-up views, you need to go into the viewing cabin to see the CCTV footage.
This year improved technology means you can get an even better look at the birds; hopefully my photo below gives you the idea.
The regular male arrived quite early this year, and was seen mating with his female within 20 minutes of her arrival a few days later.
Obviously foreplay is not an Osprey speciality! There are now three eggs in the nest which are due to hatch any time from mid-May onwards.
Again with lucky timing, I watched the female take over incubating duties from the male and then carefully rotate the eggs to ensure an even temperature.
The eggshells have a wonderful blood-red marbling pattern all over – how often do you get to see something like that?
After turning them all over to her satisfaction and fidgeting around for a little while, the female settled down onto the nest while the male flew to a nearby tree to keep an eye on things.
All this in the beautiful setting of the Glaslyn valley, with the backdrop of Cnicht, the Welsh Matterhorn, glowing in the sunlight.
Can it get any better than that?
Well, perhaps it can.
The other morning, back at home, we noticed the herring gulls were making even more noise than usual.
Looking out the window, we could see every bird in the area had flown up into the sky and was circling around in the air much higher than usual, almost giving the effect of a tornado in the sky over the town.
Their alarm cries were extremely agitated; clearly something had them very worried. The bird tornado seemed to be getting closer, and looking high into the sky we could make out a much larger bird flying steadily towards us: an Osprey.
Closer and closer it came, until it flew right over our heads as we peered out of the window, playing Pied Piper to the trail of Herring Gulls following in its wake.
A magnificent bird of prey seen out of our sitting room window, how cool is that?
But if that wasn't enough, yesterday’s view topped the bill.
I paid an early visit before work to Conwy RSPB to catch up with a beautiful male Garganey that had just arrived on the freshwater lagoon: a dapper brown and grey duck with a startling broad white eyestripe that looked so smart in the early sunshine.
Again our attention was attracted upwards by the reaction of the birds around us. Some birds on the lagoon lifted up in the air, feeling threatened by a predator and looking up, we could clearly see an Osprey flying towards the hide, being harried by a valiant pair of Oystercatchers, an avian David challenging Goliath.
This time the Osprey flew by much lower and was so close, we could clearly see its white belly and the slight mottled effect at the base of its throat, its pale underwings with a black patch at its 'wrist' and the long black 'fingers'.
It really was amazing to see this spectacular bird so close, and made a fantastic start to the day.
Going into the office was such an anticlimax!
