First recorded pair of breeding Ospreys in Yorkshire produce two chicks

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A young pair of ospreys have successfully bred on the Bolton Estate in North Yorkshire for the first time in hundreds of years.

Ospreys have never been recorded as breeding in Yorkshire since records began in 1800 and were generally extinct in the UK until returning initially to remote parts of Scotland from Scandinavia in the 1950s.

The very first Osprey nest for centuries in Yorkshire, on the Bolton Castle Estate near Leyburn in Wensleydale now has a young adult pair who have produced two chicks (one male and one female).

Tom Orde-Powlett, whose family own the estate, praised the work of the estate keepers, both for highlighting to him that a pair of Ospreys were regularly visiting the estate, and also for their subsequent work building nesting platforms and monitoring the birds’ progress.

Brian Towers & one of his nesting platforms

Sacha Dench, Founder of Conservation Without Borders and Ambassador for the UN’s Convention on Migratory Species, and the Flight of the Osprey Expedition team visited the site on Friday 5 August as part of their journey following the Osprey migration route from Scotland to Africa.

Dench and her team met with Tom Orde-Powlett, son of Lord Bolton, and other individuals who have been instrumental in creating this notable Osprey nesting site at the Bolton Castle Estate.

The mother of the new chicks is known as ‘Blue KS1’ and hatched at Glaslyn in Wales in 2018. Her mate is un-ringed. KS1’s mother is known as 'Mrs G' and has been returning to Wales since 2004. Her father, known as Aran, has been with Mrs G since 2012. This is the first of Aran's offspring known to be breeding.

Tom Orde-Powlett, in cooperation with a number of interested organisations, instigated the re-colonisation on the Bolton Castle Estate. One of Tom’s gamekeepers noticed two birds together in the area, which gave Tom the confidence that there could be a pair establishing a territory. With the expert help of Mike Thornley of Thornley Wildlife Trust and Brian Towers, Toms’ river keeper and former tree surgeon, two platforms were built on the Estate.

Brian Towers building the nesting platform
The pair that had been seen by the gamekeeper ultimately built a nest on one of the platforms and produced the two chicks in mid-June which have now been ringed.

Rufus Orde-Powlett observing Jill Warwick and Peter Davies ringing chicks

Tom said:

“Over the last twenty years or so I had seen Ospreys with increasing frequency, and in 2019 what we thought might be a pair were spotted. I decided to stock two ponds near where we had seen them with some trout, hoping that a good food source would keep them here and also reduce pressure on wild fish.

Friends, family and colleagues from Natural England, the Cumbria Raptor Study Group, BASC and the Lower Ure Conservation Trust all helped in assessing where might be best to build nesting platforms near the areas where the pair were mostly frequenting. 

We were overjoyed when they eventually built a nest on one of our platforms and we saw the hen bird apparently sitting on something – we hoped an egg – in May, which would mean potential hatching in mid-June.

One of our keepers has taken a keen interest and has been checking the nest every day of incubation. I had a real shock on the day we thought was hatching day when a local farmer who had been observing them on his rounds saw a large amount of net trailing behind the flying male bird. We climbed up to the nest site but luckily by the time we got there the male had freed himself of whatever it was and seemed fine.

We were pretty confident of one chick but when we went to ring them we were thrilled to discover two, one of each sex.”

Sacha Dench added:

“I am incredibly honoured to be able to visit the very first Osprey breeding pair in Yorkshire. What Tom and his colleagues have achieved is nothing short of a miracle!

Our expedition is designed to shine a light on some of the fantastic efforts organisations and individuals like Tom are making to address the challenges faced by Ospreys and other migratory birds. In the long run we humans can do so much to help ospreys and a wide range of other birds and animals whose lives, like our own, depend on healthy, unpolluted land and oceans.”

Simon Warwick MBE, Director, Lower Ure Conservation Trust concluded

“Based on photos, it appears that the male Osprey comes south to Nosterfield Nature Reserve to fish on most days - an easy return trip for an osprey. Interestingly every fish we have managed to identify him catch has been a chub.

It has been a real delight to work with Tom on this and to witness his enthusiasm.  As he suggests, all our research indicates that this pair is the first in Yorkshire in historic times – incredibly exciting and hopefully the beginning of a Yorkshire dynasty!”

NOTE: It is a criminal offence to approach or disturb nesting Ospreys and other raptors