Drawing to a close - or is it?

With all four youngsters now fledged, the season is drawing to an end.

But don't forget that the family should remain around the cathedral until August at least and that watching the young learn to fly and the parents teach them to hunt is a great spectacle. You may still catch one of the young or an adult via the web cams though their presence will be less reliable (three birds were visible on the tower web cams on Thursday evening I'm told).
Watch Points continue until the end of next week (on 23rd, 27th, 28th and 30th) weather permitting - so do try to come down and meet us if you've not been already (and if the weather is better than today!).

And please do send us a donation if you've not done so yet - especially as we have this amazing offer still operating: namely, whatever you give us, our anonymous donor will add on three times what you give! We've received over £500 so far from many donors (see below) which equates to £2000 when the multiplier effect is applied. That is a marvellous start - but our target is much higher!

We want to do so much more than the HLF grant will allow us to do....so please send us something, however small. How to do it is explained on the previous post. For most people in the UK at least the easiest way is either to write a cheque payable to DWT and send it to DWT, East Mill, Belper, DE56 1XH or to ring the Trust on 01773 881188 (office hours) and pay using a debit card.
Donors so far include the following to whom many thanks:
Jane W, Phoebe, Mr. G, Ann G, Brian Q, Anon, Caroline H, Mrs Burton, Kevin H, Terence B, Gorsefield Primary School, Helen D in Arkansas, Anon, Mrs C, Brenda P in Montreal, @sueperegrino, Mrs P, Ann Frogatt, Mrs Tillett, Mrs W and Roger S in Austria. There may be more, eg those sent in via the bank but for which we don't yet have the details.

Anyway, a big thank you to everyone for your generosity. It really is very heartening to see how much the birds and the project mean to so many people.

A tail of two halves: this afternoon, I had a call saying there was a bird on the ground in the main city bus station that looked like a peregrine. When I arrived the bird had flown but a photo taken on a mobile phone showed it to be just a mistle thrush. Clearly, any bird found in the city is now thought by the public to be a peregrine!
I also called at the cathedral and was handed a brown envelope by the head verger which, once opened, contained a crisp £50 note, an anonymous donation. A big thank you to whoever left this generous contribution should they be reading this....and sorry if you had come to Derby specifically to attend the watch point. The weather this morning (Thursday) was really appalling and not fit for running a Watch Point.

Thanks to Tim: Tim Brooks has now left the employ of the wildlife trust where he was the People and Wildlife Manager since summer 2009, and as such officially in charge of this project. He steered the HLF bid to success, kept both the budgets under control and a wary eye on Nick M and me too! His contribution to the project will be missed. The post he held is not being continued with so it seems the project will now fall under the aegis of Matt Croney at DWT.
We wish Tim all the best in his new job and thank him for his contribution to the project.

Nick B (DWT)
Photos: show a juv in front of the stonework (by Andy Byron) and a food exchange between adult and youngster/sand the adult female passing the flag on the top of the tower as she arrives on the pinnacle on which she likes to watch over proceedings (three shots by Ian Bradley). And a photo of Jurys Inn on top of which the juvs have been spending quite a bit of time recently.

Lottery grant launch talk: this link on the DWT website gives the history of the project; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTPla0gtUfk&feature=plcp