Country diary: The osprey is low in her nest - she's incubating eggs | Merryn Glover

Badenoch, Cairngorms: Only her head is visible, turning sharply to and fro, golden eyes surveying the landEvery year we wait and wonder. Will they come back? Will they reunite and mate? Will the chicks survive? This agonising starts in late March as we scan the skies above the loch for the return of the ospreys from Africa. One normally arrives in late March or early April, usually the male, with a mate soon after. For 14 years, the female was the beloved "Green DY", known by her plastic leg ring, which successfully fledged chicks in all but one year of her tenure. That was 2012, when she was defeated by torrential rain.But last year she never appeared, and there was a sigh of loss across the internet. A new female came, however, partnering with DY's old mate, and produced three chicks. The same pair are back, proving nature's cycles of renewal, given a chance. Persecuted to extinction in Britain by 1916, ospreys returned to Speyside in the Cairngorms in 1954 and, gradually, to other sites across the UK. A pair built the nest here in Badenoch exactly 30 years ago, and it has yielded 59 young. This is especially impressive when most years the happy couple must endure winter's departing kick of a snowstorm in April. Continue reading...