Still three on last Watch Point day

Update 15th June:
Watch Point volunteer Helen went down to the Cathedral on Sunday morning and reported seeing all five birds looking fine!

The Sunday Times (16 June) had a short article in the print edition about peregrines on UK cathedrals with a mention of the Derby Cathedral birds included. 

There's a much longer, online article with many more photos and quotes but it is behind a £1 /month paywall.

Update 14th June: all three have fledged successfully with at least one returning occasionally.
If you've enjoyed watching the webcams do please consider making a donation to keep the project going for next year.

There's a donations tab on the top of the blog landing page.

Many thanks and see you all next year!

Ps The web cams stay live all year round and the adults remain close to and sometimes on the nest platform.....

Update 11 June:
More photos by Dave Farmer, taken yesterday, show the now confident male, XRL on the tower's stonework shouting for food:

And looking down on the world below:

Update 8th June:

The Watch Point was slightly disrupted by other events going on nearby but our volunteers stayed through to the end so a big thank you to them and for helping out at all four Watch Points. Thanks too to the DWT staff who helped and to John from Cathedral Quarter who organised the gazebo.

Volunteer Helen summarising the morning said:

A very active morning. The adults and all three juveniles were showing well all the time. There were several occasions when we thought one of the young birds was going to fly. One of them fluttered up to the right hand side of the platform and briefly perched at the side of the camera bracket, before dropping back down on to the scrape.
One of the big females looks ready to go. Lots of wing flapping and head bobbing. We could clearly see the difference in size between the male juvenile and the two bigger females when all three were perched on the edge of the platform.
A red kite drifted overhead, prompting the adult male to fly from it's perch half way up the tower. One of the adult falcons very nearly caught a pigeon just to the left of us over the buildings but the pigeon just managed to swerve out of the way at the last moment. There was also a tussle with the local gulls to add to the scene!

Wendy Bartter made this video today:

And on Friday, Dave Farmer took these photos:

                               Showing the difference between the adult on the right and the juvenile.
                                                                Photo: Dave Farmer

                      One of the bigger female juveniles looks out on a busy Cathedral Green below
                                                     Photo: Dave Farmer

                         No sign of any white fluff now! Photo: Dave Farmer

The Project Team
The Project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust support from partners The Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and Derby City Council

Return to the nest, the last Watch Point tomorrow and a request

It seems the young male that fell off on Tuesday has managed to get back to the nest platform with all three juveniles present this morning (Friday 7th).
Thanks to everyone who sent in comments.
When a juvenile leaves the nest platform, it is rare for it to return so quickly so this was quite a surprise.
This screengrab is by Kate and shows all three this morning:

Meanwhile the final Watch Point takes place tomorrow, Saturday 8th and by then, who knows what might have happened.
So do come down to the Cathedral if you live nearby.
DWT trainee Chloe and our excellent Watch Point volunteers look forward to seeing you!

This project comes to you free and 24/7. It costs between £2-3000 to run each year and we rely to a great extent on donations from web cam watchers. So please consider sending a donation if you have enjoyed (and are still enjoying) watching.

There's a donations tab on the blog landing page.

Many thanks in advance!

The Project Team
The Project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with support from its partners The Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and the City Council IT team.

First chick leaves

Early yesterday morning (about 6 am, Tuesday 4th) the smallest chick (colour ring XRL, probably a male, the smallest of the three when ringed) accidentally fell off the platform but ended up on a chimney above Irongate nearby.
It should be fine but checks will be made to see where it has got to.
Thanks to Nick M and local watcher Cliff for eventually finding it, aided by Jessica from the Cathedral to whom also many thanks.

One of Cliff's photos:

And here is one of Dave Farmer's photos taken on Monday when all three chicks were still present:

The Project Team
The project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with great support from its partners, Derby Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and the City Council's IT team.

Third watch point coming up plus latest photos

 June 2nd Update:

The third Watch Point went well even though the sun didn't oblige.
164 visitors were logged. Helen, one of our long term volunteers wrote:
A lot of people already seemed to have been following the blog and already knew quite a bit about the project. A young girl said she had been watching in school and had come specifically to have a look. Quite a few visitors seemed happy to stick around while one family had been to every watchpoint so far this season! It was good to see some familiar faces from past years including one lady who has also been every week...and there were lots of good questions from people which kept us busy! 
Big thanks to everyone who helped out!

The final Watch Point is on Saturday 8th June between 10 am and    2 pm. As you can see below, the chicks are really advanced  so they should be on the verge of fledging by then!

Dave Farmer took these great photos on Wednesday (28th):

To see Wendy Bartter's many video's of feeding sessions scroll down to the comments at the foot of the previous post.

Hope to see you on Saturday?

The Project Team
The project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with support from its partners Derby Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and the City Council IT team.

Watch Point well supported and the second was today

Monday 27th: Wendy's YT video of the chicks today shows them getting their feathers:

Saturday 25th May Watch Point report:

There were more than one hundred visitors including some who had been last week and others who came back for more later on!
The birds were less active until late on when both adult birds arrived back so there was more to see. 

               The male looks on as the female feeds the chicks. Photo by Joyce Sawford.

The male retrieved some cached prey from one of the alcoves on the 'window' which he seemed to leave on the scrape. The female was then seen feeding the chicks. From the ground it looked as if all three chicks were getting fed and this was confirmed when checks of the web cams were made on mobiles.

There was also an art group present who were sketching.  One of them, Tom Burley, produced this quick painting of the watchpoint:

The next Watch Point is on Saturday 1st June and the last on 8th June. Do come along if you can.....

Report on the first Watch Point on 18th May:

Over 180 visitors, including many children, visited the first watch point event today (18th).
The weather was great and the birds performed well.
Huge thanks to our volunteers for giving up their time today and to Cathedral Quarter for the use of a gazebo and funding support as well!

The Project Team
This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with great support from The Cathedral staff, Cathedral Quarter and the city council's IT team.

Come and see the chicks and adults 'for real'

This Saturday (18th) sees the first of four Peregrine Watch Point events take place on the grass of Cathedral Green on Full Street behind the Cathedral.
They are free and everyone is welcome to drop in at any time between 10am and 2pm and to use the telescopes the Wildlife Trust provides and talk to our brilliant and knowledgeable volunteers and staff.
Seeing the birds 'in the flesh' provides a completely different experience from watching them on the web cams.

You'll see the adults flying about and of course be able to marvel at the wonderful grade 1 listed tower built in the 1530s with its strange 'grotesques' in the shape of various real and mythical animals.
Come for five minutes or, if the weather is favourable, bring a chair or a rug and stay much longer!
There will be games for children too...

The other three Watch Points will run at the same times (10am to 2pm) on Saturdays 25th May, 1st June and 8th June (by which time the chicks will be close to flying!)

Please scroll down this blog to read about the ringing of the chicks earlier this week and  even further down to read about the hatching of the eggs.
You can leave comments by clicking on 'comments' at the foot of each blog post.

The Project Team
This 18 year old project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with great support from The Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and the City Council's IT team.

The three chicks get their bling!

 Rings were put on the legs of the three chicks today (14th May). Abseilers Nick and Jess collected the chicks at the nest platform and lowered them down to be ringed inside the tower by a team of skilled, licenced bird ringers.

Two chicks weighed over 600 grams and were judged to be females.
They have colour rings XSL and XTL.
The third chick, probably the last one to hatch, which also had very little in its crop, was just over 500 grams and so was probably, but not certainly, a male. Its colour ring is XRL.

The photos below are by Chloe, one of the ringers and by Jessica from the Cathedral - thanks to both:

Nick and Jess arrive at the platform and tie themselves off

Bagging the chicks before sending them down to be ringed. Screenshot by Jessica

                                   Close up of colour ring XSL (Jessica Kilmurray)

The three chicks after being ringed. Photo by Chloe

Chick being weighed, siting quietly in a flower pot.....

                       Look closely to see the metal BTO ring which has a unique number on it.
                                                                Photo by Chloe

The first Watch Point event is this Saturday 18th - more on this to follow on Thursday.

The Project Team
This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with the great support of three partners: Derby Cathedral, Cathedral Quarter and Derby City Council.

Growing fast

The three chicks will grow very fast and do so without getting a drink!
This screenshot by Margaret Cowley shows them very well as they are now:

And here is just one of Wendy Bartter's many YouTube videos showing a feed (at 6pm yesterday, May 3rd). To see others check out the comments at the foot of each post:

The speed of the chick's development is remarkable. In just seven weeks they will be the size of their parents and be ready to fledge. Artwork by crowartist.co.uk :

If you are a first time visitor to this blog, welcome! Please scroll down to read more of the story so far this year.

The Project Team
The project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust working in partnership with the Cathedral, Derby City Council's IT team and Cathedral Quarter.

Chicks are hatching.....

 Update Wednesday a.m.:
Looks like the last egg won't now hatch.

Nick Moyes was on national BBC Breakfast show this morning.
Here's the link, One hour 42 minutes in:
BBC iPlayer - Breakfast - 01/05/2024 

Welcome to all first time visitors to the blog and the web cams!
If you scroll down the blog you'll see what's been happening recently.


By Monday morning (29th) the three chicks were visible in the morning sunlight as seen in this screengrab by Kate:

To read more of the hatching story, scroll down to the previous post.

Meanwhile, here's a video captured by Wendy Bartter this afternoon (29th):

The Project Team
This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with its partners: Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council and Cathedral Quarter.

Photos, news of four Watch Point events and now three chicks!

Update at 7 am Saturday morning: early web cam watchers have seen a chick and by lunchtime there were two! Screenshots below by Helen and Kate and video by Wendy.
And by Sunday morning there were three......

Screengrab by Helen showing both chicks:

And here's a video by Wendy of a feeding attempt:

Photographer Dave Farmer took these fine photos of our peregrines mid week, copied here while we waited for an egg to hatch!

        The male sits on the camera avoiding the plastic (anti-pigeon) spikes intended to                                stop him sitting there and possibly fouling the lens!
                               Photo: Dave Farmer (easyphotography.co.uk ).

 The female leaving the platform. Photo: Dave Farmer (easyphotography.co.uk )

Here's a screenshot taken today by Kate showing the smaller male and larger female plus four eggs still.

Watch Points 2024

There will be four Watch Point events behind the cathedral on the green this summer enabling visitors to use our telescopes to see the birds 'for real' and close up.
The dates for your diaries are all Saturdays:
18 and 25 May and 1 and 8 June.
Further details nearer the time......

The Project Team
This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust with its partners, Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council and Cathedral Quarter.

Good news for iPhone viewers

 Update 24th April: Get ready - we think one of our eggs has already 'pipped'. Hatching seems imminent! Check viewer comments on this post for the latest updates from our keen webcam watchers.

We're pleased to be able to announce that both of our web cameras can now be viewed on all iPhones!

For the last year or more, old iPhones could display NESTCAM 2, but not those with modern versions of Safari or other browsers. It seemed ironic that my ancient iPhone5 worked OK, but not my recent purchase of a modern iPhone SE. This all came to a head whilst we tried to adjust the position of NESTCAM 2 whilst dangling on an abseil rope without being able to see how our changes were actually affecting the view! 

After finally investigating the issue, our webhosting  supplier, Streamdays, appears to have resolved the issue. Thanks, too, to Tim Unwin from Derby City Council. This is a screenshot taken today on an iOS 17 device. Whilst only NESTCAM 1 has sound, it's great that mobile users can now watch either camera.

(Eagle-eyed viewers might already have spotted that NESTCAM 2 is lagging an hour behind. We'll try and fix that next time we're up inside Derby Cathedral tower.)

Please let us know by leaving a comment if you're still having difficulties viewing either webcamera, but make sure to describe what system you are trying to view them on.

The Project Team 

 

And then there were three....and now four!

Update Monday 25th: four eggs were spotted by Jean at 7am this morning with a photo of them on flickr.
Here's a video by Wendy which shows all four about 50 seconds in (and please see our note about making a donation at the foot of this post):

The third egg, with more colour, was laid during Friday/Saturday night around 4am. as observed by Mrs. Lee.
This screengrab showing the smaller male looking at the eggs is by Helen Naylor:

A video by Wendy Barrter shows the three eggs this morning:

With luck egg number 4 will appear perhaps on Monday and then the serious task of incubation will start in earnest.

The Project Team
This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in conjunction and with the excellent support of Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council's IT team and Cathedral Quarter.

The project relies on donations from web cam watchers for much of its funding so if you have been enjoying watching our birds, please consider making a donation. There's a yellow tab on the blog linking you to several ways you can donate. 

Thanks in advance!

Egg Number two on 20th March

 A second egg had arrived by early morning (20th) as expected.
It looks to be the same pale colour as the first. Thanks to Kate (for the screenshot) and Jean for the heads up!

And another screenshot from Kate in Devon:

Meanwhile if this is your first visit to the blog, scroll down to read about the first egg and also check out the comments!

Here's some local media coverage of the first egg:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-68594839


We have had over 5000 hits since last week making over 33,000 since January 1st.
Scroll down the blog right hand side to see the ClustrMap of the world showing where folk have been watching.
Over the life of the project there have been over 4 million hits from over 70 countries, an indication of just how popular our birds are!

The Project Team

This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in conjunction and with the excellent support of Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council's IT team and Cathedral Quarter.

How long before we have an egg? No time at all!

Two hours after writing the post below, the female laid her first egg (at about noon on 17th), a day earlier than last year!
Thanks to Vic P and Jean for spotting it so quickly!
We expect her to lay three more at roughly two day intervals to complete her clutch.
Note that it is normal for the egg to be left on its own. Full incubation won't begin until the third or fourth egg is laid.
See some media coverage here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-68594839

Screengrab by Helen Naylor

And here's a video of egg laying made by Wendy Barrter. The egg appears at 1 min 40 seconds in:

And a later one made at 17.27 showing the egg very clearly:

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Last year the first egg was laid on 18th March and that's tomorrow.

Wendy's video's (see the links in the comments to the previous blog post below) suggest the female is showing all the signs of being ready to lay.
Mating will have been taking place though this doesn't occur within sight of the web cam but usually higher up on the tower, often on the 'bottoms' of the grotesques, the 16th century animals carved by the stone masons in the shape of a dog, a lion, a pig etc.

2023 photo of mating by Dave Farmer (easyphotography.co.uk 

And below is a old photo of a lion grotesque.

BTW, a grotesque is a carving of an (often mythical) animal but with no actual function. A gargoyle is a grotesque with a hole running through it and out of the mouth which drains water off a roof above.

A lion grotesque by Gareth Walker

Who will spot the first egg and when will it be laid?
We should soon find out!

Talk worth attending!

There's a talk about The Peregrine this Friday (22nd, 7.30pm) in Derby for the county bird club by the authors of a brilliant new book on this falcon.
£2.50 entry. Details: Meetings and Trips (derbyshireos.org.uk)

The Project Team

This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in conjunction and with the excellent support of Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council's IT team and Cathedral Quarter.

Ps. This spring, two trainees at the wildlife trust, Emma Harpham and Chloe Davenport-Kelly will be delivering assemblies and sessions about our peregrines in a few selected primary schools in the Derby area. If you are a teacher at one and would like a visit, do get in touch. (peregrines@derbyshirewt.co.uk)

Clean up day

Today (28th) Nick Moyes abseiled down to clean the nest platform, add new gravel and clean and reposition the cameras and to Nick Evans who assisted. A BIG THANKS to them both.
Wendy Bartter's much speeded up video shows Nick M cleaning the gravel and cameras. It actually took him 45 minutes!



Nick Evans built the first platform and when it eventually showed signs of rot, he kindly build us a second one, the one which is in place now.

Nick Moyes has worked voluntarily on this project since 2005, setting up the web cams and their connectivity to the web. The project wouldn't exist without him nor would it have lasted so long.
 

Nick Moyes and Nick Evans, during a previous abseil

Here's Wendy Bartter's very speeded up video showing Nick M at work on the platform/scrape. What took 45 minutes now takes only a few!

Now we hope to see plenty of mutual display between the male and female peregrines as we approach egg laying.

The Project Team

This project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in conjunction and with the excellent support of Derby Cathedral, Derby City Council's IT team and Cathedral Quarter.

New photos of our birds, that old egg and two talks on peregrines

Last week, regular photographer Dave Farmer took some excellent photos of the falcons from the ground and they are well worth sharing:

The female on the platform edge. Dave Farmer

'She who conquers'. Photo: Dave Farmer

The male keeps a watchful eye. Photo Dave Farmer

And just to be clear: the egg you can see on the webcams is an addled egg from last year and not a new 2024 egg. We hope to remove it and clean up the platform before any eggs are laid this spring.

Wendy Bartter is putting almost daily videos of the birds on YouTube and the links to them are in the comments to each blog post.
Find those she has made in the last few weeks in comments to the previous blog post entry by scrolling down and new videos in comments to this post.
Coming up are two talks by the authors of a new book on The Peregrine Falcon, Richard Sale & Steve Watson. One is in Buxton on 9th March and the other in Derby on 22nd March
For details see: Meetings and Trips (derbyshireos.org.uk) .

The Project Team

Peregrine egg thief gets jail sentence

A covert operation by the RSPB has resulted in a man from mid Derbyshire being jailed for stealing peregrine eggs from a nest in a quarry near Bolsover.
This is the first custodial sentence for this offence in the county and a welcome step up from the paltry fines which have previously been handed out.

See also:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-67987416 

The theft of peregrine eggs for sale (usually as chicks once they have hatched) continues since they fetch such high prices in the Middle East. 
The RSPB, Derbyshire Wildlife Trust and the police have been working on this issue for several years with covert cameras up at several nest sites in remote parts of the county.

The Project Team
The Project is managed by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust

Welcome to 2024!

 Happy New Year to all our Peregrine watchers!

The indefatigable Wendy Bartter continues to make many video clips of our birds through the relatively quiet winter months and puts them on You Tube.

Here's the one she made today - 1st January 2024 which has the female  preening in the sunlight and then repeatedly calling to her mate (from about 2 minutes in).
To find others, please check out the comments to previous posts...and also commenst to this post for any new ones.
Thanks Wendy so much for all you excellent work with these videos!

Last year we had over 224,000 views showing just how popular these Derby peregrine are across the globe. Our Project began back in 2006, and webcameras and were installed a year later. Since that time the cameras have attracted over 5.1 million unique visitors!
Scroll down the blog and you will find a Clustrmap showing where all our blog visitors and readers have come from over the past month.

Best wishes

The Project Team