2 years ago an Osprey named Rothiemurchus was tagged as part of the Osprey Satellite Tracking Project and Roy Dennis has been tracking him ever since.

He was the oldest chick of a brood of three males which were ringed on 10th August 2009. He had a hazardous first autumn migration and was nearly lost at sea off Portugal after a direct flight from England. Happily he survived and recuperated in the Portugese mountains and later flew south to Senegal where he spent two winters and a summer. Now he is making his first migration north as a two-year old and you can follow his progress here.

He has just crossed the Sahara Desert and is heading north through Morocco - and should be near the Straits of Gibraltar soon. He is the first two-year old Roy has tracked with the GPS system and so it’s really interesting to follow his migration route back to the UK. At the moment we don’t know whether he will reach Scotland this year or just hang out in England or Western Europe for the summer, but follow the link below to keep your eye on his progress and the other birds Roy tracks.

Rothiemurchus Forest Narrowly Avoids Fire Disasters Over Bank Holiday.

The ancient forest of Rothiemurchus narrowly avoided two fire disasters over the bank holiday weekend thanks to quick thinking members of the estate team taking immediate action.

The first fire was started on the banks of Loch An Eilein for a BBQ, despite the high fire risk signs around the area, which are put up to enable visitors to understand the risks to the surrounding flora and fauna, and themselves, when ground is dry and fires can quickly become unmanageable. Rothiemurchus Countryside Ranger Alph Mcgregor was fortunately on hand to put it out quickly before he was called away to the second fire.

The second fire in one of the most special areas of the ancient native forest was brought under control by head stalker, Peter Ferguson, when he noticed smoke coming from whilst returning home on Sunday afternoon. Heading straight to the area under threat, Peter called the fire brigade and other members of the Rothiemurchus Rangers team for assistance.  Alph Mcgregor, Maintenance Manager Euan Gillies and estate resident Pete Wright arrived with the Argocat and fire pump to help Peter extinguish the embers.

His timely actions meant that the fire caused significantly less destruction to this historically and environmentally important part of Scotland than it might have done. However, it has damaged more than half an acre of very old ‘Caledonian’ forest  and the wild ‘campers’ that started the fire even felled trees and hammered nails into the trees to build a shelter, left broken glass and batteries on the ground which caused even more damage to a wild and sensitive place.

Johnnie Grant of Rothiemurchus said: “To light an open fire in or near a forest can cause lasting damage and is therefore irresponsible. If our team hadn’t acted as quickly or a wind had got up, the fire could have lost control rapidly and burned a very large area and we would be dealing with a very different situation today.

“Fire is the greatest threat to the forest and its wildlife, once established it can take months to put out and the forest takes decades to recover from the damage caused.

“Responsible access is now a legal right to be carefully safeguarded; we all have a responsibility to promote behavior that is appropriate for this fragile and very popular irreplaceable forest heritage.

“At the moment there is a high fire risk, which makes it even more important that anyone seeing any fire in or around the forest, rings the fire brigade, police or estate staff immediately they see any sign of a fire. Whatever the time of year every indication of fire has to be investigated and can result in the fire brigade being called.  We urge everyone visiting the estate and any part of the local countryside to not light fires anywhere near the forest, even if you think it is safe to do. Please be aware that the consequences are very serious and damage lasts for decades.”

The Rothiemurchus team will continue to inspect the fire sites daily until there has been prolonged rain and they are certain that the fires are not still smoldering in peat or roots to reappear on dry and windy days.