Great to have the Dragoness back in the air again, and in the sunshine for a change. :-)

These two birds are in dire need of a moult after their travels half way around the world. The pair are nest building, but we don't really expect breeding success this year, but to satisfy their urge to build, we popped some more nesting material in the aviary today. We enjoy seeing them flying laps around the aviary from CCTV and it's great to see them enjoying the space this huge aviary gives them. While in the aviary, we picked up the moulted feather that was the subject of our previous post. Here is a slow motion of the female flying from floor to the nest.

Who can guess what species of bird this feather came from? :-)

Even through the worst of the weather, these two new arrivals continued to modify and alter their nest. Now the weather has calmed and warmed a little (although still below 0°C at night), they are obsessively building, food passing, and making (very loud) noise like the Martians in the film Mars Attacks! Having only been here a few months, we are really surprised by how settled they are, and how quickly they have moved into breeding condition. We think the chances of them actually breeding this year are realistically zero to none, especially with the female still carrying some juvenile feathers, but it bodes incredibly well for the future. Having said all that, as a species that has NEVER been bred in captivity in Europe before (we can't find any breeding records of them breeding in captivity anywhere in the west, so if anyone has any information, we would be happy to hear from you), we don't even know when to expect them to breed!

While we are waiting for the start of tonights Wild Britain on Channel 5 at 9pm, (we contributed with a Kestrel) we took a look back at a vide we recorded on a Blackberry phone today. These guys are bold in their territorial disputes! The joy is that this 14 acre field holds at least 20 territorial pairs. The field is the centre of the conservation programme we run, and 7 years ago when we started, it was a wildlife barren 14 acre cereal monoculture. Nothing lived there. We took oit on, and manage the filed for the partridge. The joy is how that work, feed, and management has brought the place alive. It is heaving with partridge, and the bonus has been the plethora of wildlife that has followed. From shrews to skylarks, voles to buzzards, short eared owls to kestrels, deer to hares, the place is heaving with every type of wildlife you can imagine, not to memntion the planlife of all kinds that include orchids and borage. It is a joy to spend time there. The stars remain the very brazen partridge!

Sorry for the picture quality, this is a picture from a CCTV screen. No mistaking though, that this is an eagle with a distant idea of fledging on its mind!

Another little reminder for you all to tune in to Channel 5 at 9pm again tonight (Tuesday). Wild Britain airs its 3rd episode, which is also the 3rd to which we have made a contribution. This episode is on coasts. Make the most of this one (but keep watching the excellent series) because our last episode is number 8 on Cities, so you'll have to wait to see birds from our team again. Guess who is included?

Following the disappearance of another wild Golden Eagle in Scotland. We are considering running a short fundraiser to gather the money to cover the costs of a new GPS transmitter and a years worth of data transmission/recovery. The solar charged GPS transmitters cost £3,000, and year of data transmission/recovery costs around £1,000. Before we make the process formal, we have to have some further communication with the various concerned authorities. Initial contact has been made, and further discussions are planned for next week. This post is an exploration to see if whether, from our followers, we might have a chance of reaching the target? If we failed, we would have to return any donations up to the point we accept our fundraiser had failed. If successful we would, through this Facebook page, our Twitter page, Instagram feed, and website, share all details gathered by the unit we fund, including the fitting of the tag, wanderings of the bird it is fitted to via the data gathered, and all other associated information. We would additionally appeal to businesses and any individual interested in making an altruistic act to help support or ever pressured magnificent and wild birds of prey. https://twitter.com/RaptorPolitics/status/973822598357319680

We rarely get into any political debate via our Elite falconry business page, but too much of this is happening to leave it alone.......it could become our elephant in the room. Our dismay exists not just because the loss of so many of our magnificent wild raptors, but also because of all the places we visit with out birds, especially the high places we go in winter to fly Golden Eagles, the one where we see the MOST birds of prey, both in terms of numbers, and diversity, is also the one where the prey species are in the greatest abundance, and follow decades long increases year on year. The Game keeper there of over 30 years is a wonderful and enlightened character (sadly currently looking for a new location to end his career on the hill....if anyone needs the best of the best in gamekeepers, let us know) and has done a magnificent job of proving that tremendous amounts of wildlife can inhabit a highland hill with terrific numbers of game species and predators living cheek by jowel. Sadly, there are elements among the sporting industry that are too stupid and selfish, too obsessed with outdated and frankly false Victorian beliefs, to see that they are ruining the uplands for others who wish to enjoy our native wildlife, and incredibly, that they are also driving nail after nail in the coffins of their own futures.

Marra back in the air for the first time this year. It feels like it's been a long break, but summer and thermals are just around the corner. :-)

I found a direct link to tonights Channel 5 Wild Britain episode on Forests. Please try to take a look. We assisted with thew Goshawk section along with Kirsty Allen.

Don't forget to tune your Tv's or set your recorders for tonights episode (Tuesday) of Wild Britain at 9pm on Channel 5. Tonights episode is 'Forests' and we contributed with excellent help from Kirsty Allen in the section on Goshawks. If you miss the broadcast, you can catch up on the My5 service later on. I'm not sure if this link will work, it is an embedded Tweet from the Channel 5 promotion on Twitter.......fingers crossed. https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/973529105537777664