The three chicks all continued to grow very fast, with 33(11) providing ample fish deliveries to keep them all happy. With fledging fast approaching, the chicks were weighed, measured and ringed on 23rd June, early in the morning.

All three were assessed and deemed to be in good health with, in the order of hatching, a male (ringed as 8R5), a female (8R6) and another male (8R7). The unhatched fourth egg was retrieved from the nest for inspection and it was found that it was unfertilised, so that was a popular question, often asked in the visitor centre, the hides and online, definitively answered.

July began at Manton Bay with all three Osprey chicks getting very ‘bouncy’ on the nest and helicoptering to varying degrees. On the 2nd July, the oldest of the three chicks, 8R5(26), officially fledged at 18:51, leaving the nest aged 51 days. His two younger siblings were not going to be too much longer and, sure enough, 8R7(26) took off on 7th July at 08:24 (51 days) and then 8R6(26) completed the hat-trick of fledgings just a couple of hours later, at 10:46, aged 54 days.

All three chicks swiftly learnt to really use their wings and were regularly seen flying around Manton Bay, searching out new places to rest, such as the T-perches, the fallen poplar branch or the poplars themselves. Even the fishing limit signs on the stone bund became favourite perches for 8R6(26) and 8R7(26). But, when it was time to eat, they were all quick to return to the nest and fight over the latest fish delivery, sometimes with hugely comedic results, such as when 8R5(26) was so desperate to get a fish delivery that he grabbed his dad’s talon and got dragged off the nest as 33(11) flew away! His younger brother, 8R7(26), got that fish, but 8R5(26) got his revenge a few days later by pecking 8R7(26)’s head during an attempt to grab a fish.

Within the next few weeks, it is likely that the chicks will have migrated - this usually happens between mid-August and early September.