The calm before the storm.
Saturday 1st June
This is the day we think could be departure day.
Malcolm put a timer switch on the camera, and set the video recorder,
in case they did a dawn break, but they are still with us at noon.
The birds are very restless, with lots of preening activity and
occasional bouts of violent wing flapping.
Its a beautiful day quite breezy, but with a clear blue sky
and bright sunshine just
right for a maiden flight (apart from the fact that 2 magpies have been seen
in the garden on several occasions). One
chick actually hopped up to the hole, staying there for a few seconds,
before scuttling back, and retreating firmly into the nest cup, apparently
overcome by his daring. Another chick picked a small piece of dried moss from the
nest, and held it in its beak for a while a comfort blanket?
Beauty brings the rations.
Chicks everywhere!
This year it is a different story. One chick went up to the hole, and was looking out when a parent came, and fed the chick at the hole. Another time, a parent pushed past a chick to feed the others. Shortly after this was written, a chick went up to the hole, looked out for a while and much to our, and its(?), surprise, flew. This was at 12.25pm. This must have been the bird we called Boss yesterday. He was so much more self confident and aggressive than the rest. We thought the others would follow quickly, but at 5 past 1 they were still in the box.
It is now 20 to 5 in the afternoon, and still we are waiting. The chicks alternate between periods of rest, when they cuddle close together in the nest cup, and bouts of frenzied preening, wing stretching and occasional violent wing flapping. The parents are continuing to supply plenty of food, assisted some of the time by our offerings from the mealworm feeder.
Where have they gone?
Finally, at a quarter to 6 a second chick left the box.
No - you go next!
Unusually, we saw it fly away from the box and cling clumsily to a branch just outside. A few minutes later it was off again and vanished among the foliage. We had thought it would be too late, and that they would all stay another night. Now at 7pm, it does look as though the last 5 will stay. Here they can be seen huddled together near the front wall of the box.
Is this the way out?......
...and then there were four.
So these four will presumably stay one more night in the box. We will set the recorder to start first thing in the morning and hope that we record them even if we are not awake to see them!
Sunday 2nd June
As expected, Beauty's remaining four chicks flew first thing this morning. Unfortunately, owing to a switch being left in the wrong position, the VCR did not record their going and when we got up at a civilised hour, there was nothing to see but an empty nest.
So here's a picture of Battler with her ever hungry chicks. They are growing fast and will be gone within the week. Lets hope they get a good start to life outside the nest with some warm, dry weather!
MORE!
Please come back soon!
Surely some food will come soon?
At last, they haven't forgotten us!
That wasn't much!
Just give us the food!!!
Just five days to go now.
We're STILL hungry!
Monday 3rd June
At the start of the day, it was the same story, the chicks all crying out for food.
That's more like it.
Not another one?
We counted up later and found that in the half hour period from 9.10am, the parents brought food 43 times - that's once every 42 seconds. Even these chicks' guts cannot continue to digest it at this rate.
The chicks became more active during the day. They are occasionally leaving the nest cup, and one made a complete circuit round the edge, before ending in a corner and having a bout of violent wing flapping. This is the first time this wing exercise has been seen, and there were one or two more sessions later.
At the end of the day Battler was desperately trying to brood her chicks. Whether she managed to calm them down eventually will have to remain between them and her as we switched off and left them to it.
Tuesday 4th June
Life continues as before. The chicks did not seem so hungry today. Here they are at half past six in the evening looking almost contented. Except for one chick, they are not even keeping an eye on the entrance hole!
When last seen before turning the light off, Battler was roosting in the nest box but sitting largely on the side and not in the nest cup.
Victor bringing a mealworm.
Thursday 6th June
This morning, Malcolm took the ladder and looked inside box 1 where Beauty and Beau had raised their brood. He was trying to settle the question of whether or not all eight of Beauty's eggs hatched.
It was already clear that no remaining egg was visible to the camera and when he looked and felt inside the box it appeared that no egg was hidden in the nesting material either. It seems probable, therefore, that the eighth egg hatched but the chick died at a fairly early stage. This is also consistent with the fact that no egg has been seen during the 2½ weeks in which the chicks were growing before they fledged. A similar thing happened last year when the hen laid 9 eggs but only 6 chicks flew. However, there were only 2 eggs left in the nest so we presume a 7th egg hatched but the chick died at an early stage.
This year both boxes have had a very irregular pattern of egg laying and hatching. The amazing thing is that the chicks fledge so close together in time.
Here you can see that he doesn't even have to come fully into the box now, the hungry chicks will come and meet him half way.
Friday 7th June
Although we were expecting it, the departure of the first of Battler's chicks at about 9.20am today caught us by surprise. We had the VCR on but were running the webcam so we do not have a computer record of its going. Looking at the tape, it was working itself up to it for a little while before hand. As well as hopping up and down, looking out of the hole and flapping its wings a lot, shortly before it went it hopped up onto the nest box hole several times and looked out for a while before retreating back inside. Suddenly it was gone without our noticing at the time.
Of course, we thought that the rest would follow later today, but at the end of the day, they are all still with us.
Saturday 8th June - the last morning
We have now had a chance to look at the video of the departure of the remaining four chicks. We started recording at 5.30am and although there was a fair amount of messing about, nothing of note actually happened until nearly 6 o'clock. The first two chicks left the nest at about 7.00am and the last chick was gone by 7.28am.
The picture on the left shows the four chicks begging for food from Victor. It is interesting to note that the parents kept visiting and feeding the chicks remaining in the box until the last one had flown.
"What's he up to? He keeps looking out of the box. He's not going to disappear like Fred did is he?"
"Now what's wrong with you lot? Fred's doing fine. Pull yourselves together and come outside!" says Battler.
This is a picture from a rather interesting sequence. Victor had brought in some food but seemed strangely reluctant to let go of it. Several times, even when he actually let go, he grabbed it back again and offered it to another chick. On one occasion, he appeared to leave the nest for about 10 seconds, still holding onto the food.
Eventually, he weakened and let go. We could not see what it was. It was fairly small, similar in length to a chick's beak, and was white in colour. It must have been fairly robust physically as it took a fair amount of tugging. Could it have been a piece of peanut?
At last one of the chicks begins to realise that it is getting serious and starts to get some exercise! The others appear to be hoping that this thing will go away if they ignore it.
Shortly after, at 7 o'clock, one chick went immediately followed by another
These two birds were distraught after their brothers (or sisters) had left. They clearly didn't want to go at all.
They look as though they have made a pact. "We're staying put and that's final!!"
This soon broke down and it became clear that one chick may have been frightened of leaving- but the other was terrified!
One chick seems determined to hide - and the only place he could think of hiding was underneath his brother! For some time, one chick kept following the other around trying to hide beneath him.
The last but one chick flew at 7.25am
"Now look here lad....."
This was Victor's last visit. It seemed to do the trick!
The last shot of a chick (just) in the nest!
That's it for this year!!