One week later...

After the sad news last week that our resident female had died, we wondered how long it would be before a new female turned up.

Today we got the answer - just one week!

I went down to Derby Cathedral on Saturday morning to take some measurements up on the tower. I went first to check out how the nest platform looked from below, and noticed our resident male sitting on top of one of the cameras, well out of range of both live webcams.

Suddenly, another larger peregrine swooped down from somewhere up above and flew out low across the nave roof. Shortly after, the male followed her, and they soared up and around the tower. I was transfixed watching them. Was he chasing her off, perhaps? Or were they a pair? When he dived at her a couple of times, with talons extended, I worried that he was indeed attacking her. But they continued to circle together around the tower a couple more times before flying off in different directions.

Shortly afterwards, both birds returned to our now rather forlorn-looking wooden nest platform on the the side of the bell tower. Our resident male returned to his favourite perch on top of one of our cameras, whilst the new female stood in the sagging bottom of the gravel-free ledge. Both remained there for a considerable amount of time.

In fact, I had sufficient time to make my way up to the top of the tower and very carefully poke a mobile phone over the crenellations and sneakily capture this image of the female looking up and the male just visible on the camera (at left). 

This is very encouraging news, and amazingly fast, and we can only hope this new female stays around for the forthcoming breeding season. We are, as you would expect, making plans to replace the nest platform, though this will inevitably take some time as we negotiate the best way forward.

Nick Moyes

Project Team