Raptor Aid Round Up - Part 1.
I’ll split this in half, firstly, what I (Jimmi) have got up to in the field season which I often share across the charities socials because it lends itself to engaging lots of people about raptor conservation, it’s also active raptor conservation (although not funded by RA) and I think you need to walk the walk if you’re going to talk the talk when it comes to conservation. Secondly, I’ll share the fantastic projects we have supported and grants made with your support & donations. If I haven’t said it enough already, thank you, for your likes, shares, comments and donations, it makes a real difference.
The 2024 Field Season.
It seems to get busier every year. I won’t go into detail on productivity and how each individual species has done but off the top of my head I’ve been actively involved in monitoring over 10 species in Britain.
Ravens (honorary raptor) used to kick my season off but I don’t monitor many pairs anymore except for watching a couple of local pairs and feeding info back to a friend with a keen interest. On the subject of corvids, I do still monitor and colour ring a single pair Choughs, which are part of a much larger, long running study. Owls have included the Tawny owl project in Delamere forest that didn’t have a great year with only 4 boxes occupied, we have however started to sample nest box contents and continue the bioacoustics monitoring with the University of Chester. We also managed to get some students along to the ringing of chicks whilst I was leading a raptor monitoring afternoon for them. I located my local pair of Little owls in an Oak tree, lost track of a few other pairs and my faithful farm is now down to one pair as I’ve not seen a second pair or even one adult for several seasons in the adjacent territory. Barn owls seemed to have a good start which then fell off due to a prolonged wet spell and maybe a drop in vole productivity but many pairs did manage to raise a brood and it appears to have been an average year. Sadly, I didn’t find any time to help friends monitoring my favourite owl species, the long eared owl. If I didn’t have time for LEO I never have time for short eared owls, although I had amazing views of them on the Uists, and whilst I was there was even an individual spotted (not by me) wearing a colour ring from the satellite tagging project!
One of my highlights of the season was getting back into monitoring kestrels, in particular a local pair hanging round our farm and although they didn’t breed they really ignited that spark of monitoring stuff locally and the joy of nest finding/recording. I did have a better than average year finding Kestrel broods and most were fitted with colour rings as part of the Hawk Conservancy’s kestrel CR project. The Chester Peregrines once again produced 4 chicks and for the first time we didn’t have to go and rescue any grounded in the city. I also went with my friend and rung the Chorley Peregrines and continued to take DNA swabs for the national database. The North Wales study of the species is just about clinging on with a single pair producing only 1 chick in 2024. Merlin’s are another species not on my radar much because of time and location although the pair next to the white tailed eagles fooled us, we thought they weren’t there but on a return visit there were fledged chicks bombing about the moor and the nest had definitely been used.
I nearly forgot Hobbies, my favourite falcon species and one of the harder species to monitor breeding success. This year was my best year ever, it just seemed to click and I found eight pairs (that’s no easy feat, honest). One pair failed, I think at egg stage and probably before I properly found them incubating but the rest fledged broods of 2-3 chicks. There is nothing better than a summers evening watching a brood of hobbies fledging and learning how to use their wings.
Scotland is always a treat, good friends and incredible birds. The bulk of my time in Scotland is spent monitoring Ospreys as part of the Highland raptor monitoring group, we try to cover as many sites across the East of the Highlands with young colour ringed. Resighting are often sent in with birds being seen on their first migrations further South in the UK, across into mainland Europe and further still into Africa, there is something quite surreal about seeing a bird fishing a lagoon in the Gambia that only a few months before I met in a nest in Scotland - incredible birds. The usual golden eagle and barn owl sites were checked including the finding of an old territory reoccupied at a new nest site with a pair of chicks fledging. White tailed eagles are creeping more and more into my psyche, another chick rung and fledged from the regular nest I cover.
I was well and truly spoilt this year with a trip to the Uists with my mate and long-time eagle surveyor to start covering as many pairs of both white tailed and golden eagles we could find. It was a very long trip North with an uncomfortable sleep in the car to get the earlier ferry but once on the island what a location - my first birds off the ferry were a SEO fighting with a raven. The eagles didn’t disappoint which some amazing nest locations for both eagle species and some epic long slogs to get to them, I must remember to spend the start of 2025 getting ‘hill fit’ for the Uists 2025.
Going back to Ospreys but this time closer to home I once again climbed and rang the famous Glaslyn nest and a second private nest in Wales. Theres a third nest is on the cards that was found to late in the season and also two new nests I helped build in South Wales, one of which had Ospreys visiting and building up at the back end of the breeding season.
Once again I ran out of time to go and see my friends in the Forest of Dean and check out some of my old stomping ground for Goshawk. The CR project is still going strong down there thanks to a brilliant core group of volunteers and climbers. I also appeared on TV with my friends Prue Leith and John Playfair for their Cotswold Kitchen series (watch here - Episode 6), they have had brilliant success with the owl boxes I put up for them - Series 2 has already been filmed and will be out in the Spring so I’m told.
I’m sure I’ll hit send on this and curse myself that I have missed something crucial to share with you but hopefully this paints a picture of how busy the season can get - and all this as volunteers. It also shows how vital Raptor Aid’s grant fund can be to help people better understand and conserve birds of prey globally and why I’m so passionate about it - more on that in Part 2.
