Bluetit Diary 2002 - May (first half)

	Wednesday 1st May Another egg in box 1! Perhaps Beauty will deliver the goods after all. We set up i-Catcher to capture visits by the male for the early part of the morning and during this period on average he managed one feeding visit every 3½ minutes. That should encourage even the most flighty of birds to sit tight - but by about 10.30am she was off again. Fortunately, it was not for long.
	The first of the day's pictures of Beauty being fed. Nothing seems to be happening in box 2. Battler is still coming into the box from time to time and still roosts in it, but is neither laying nor incubating so the clutch of eight eggs appears doomed to fail.
	In this picture you can see not only the eggs but also the green caterpillar that he has just given to Beauty. She really seems to have decided that it is time to start incubating. Although she left the nest several times during the day, she never stayed away long, cuddling down for long periods. But what about the first egg, laid on 18th April and sat on most nights since? Won't it be either addled or significantly ahead of the latest egg? Time will tell. If she has started, then the last eggs should hatch on or about the 14th May.
	Malcolm has also been trying to get some pictures of our robin's nest and its chicks. We have seen both robins taking food into their box, but we have not been able to get a photograph of them yet. There is no light inside the nest box and the swaying leaves in front of it create a field of permanent movement that cannot be masked without masking out the nest itself! Also the robins move so quickly in front of the nest that it has proved impossible to capture them without the image being a blurred mess.
	Thursday 2nd May Beauty at last seems to have settled down to incubate. She has been on the eggs for most of the day, with only short absences, and Beau, her mate, has frequently been seen feeding her. We have not been around much to keep an eye on her, and as i-Catcher is set on web cam mode, we shall not have many photographs to check up on her activities.
	Friday 3rd May Beauty continues to puzzle us – having apparently been incubating for two days, we saw an eighth egg when she left the box briefly this morning. It will be interesting to see when they all hatch - if they ever do! Assuming the normal 12 to 13 days of incubation, the expected hatching date is 14th or 15th May. Conscious that we may have been neglecting Battler in box 2, we are trying to spend more time today looking at her. Her behaviour seems little changed. For example, she spent about 45 minutes from 9.19am in the box, during which time she was fed by her partner twice. After the second time, she promptly left the nest. Sometimes the male can be seen coming into the empty box looking confused. Now, at 7.15pm, Battler is back mothering the eggs and getting ready to spend another night roosting in the box. The fact that the last egg was laid on 17th April doesn't seem to worry her in the least But how would we know!! Beauty has been incubating all day and is now settling down for the night. She has been fed pretty frequently by Beau and we have great hopes that at least some of her eggs will hatch. In this picture, Beau seems strangely reluctant to release his goody!
	Finally, to show our frustration with Battler in box 2, we have picked three pictures. The first shows what we used to think was a warning "Don't dare come in here" picture, but as you can see from the second, quite the opposite is intended! The second picture shows the situation less than a second later. Clearly, that angry looking face is a "feed me" signal. A bit later and Battler is getting settled for the night. She will stay there until the next morning. All the signs there of a successful egg laying and incubation - except that she (or another bird) laid the last one 2½ weeks ago and she isn't incubating them during the day!
Saturday 4th May The system has been set to webcam mode for most of today, as we have plenty of photographs of incubating birds and Malcolm is out all weekend playing in a croquet tournament. We have usually been showing Box 1, with occasional glimpses of Box 2, until it was switched to Box 2 at 6.30pm. Unfortunately, although this year we put “depth markings” on the left hand walls of the boxes, it never occurred to us to mark the boxes as 1 and 2. Box 2 is generally cleaner, and the numbers are less bold. The nest cup is also more centrally positioned and the sitting bird is higher in the cup. Box 1 has more noticeable measuring marks, and on the right hand wall there are two small black dots just above the level of the “bedding material”. We’ll remember to number the boxes next time round. The robins are still working hard to keep the chicks well fed – with occasional help from us. We have them well trained now (or could it be the other way round)? When we put mealworms in the dish near the back door, we bang on the dustbin where the bowl is placed, and usually within about 30 seconds they get the message. They are usually rather wary if they can see us watching them, and do not go directly to the nest from the food supply. However, Elizabeth has accustomed them to having the back door of the garage left open (right opposite the nest), and on 2 occasions today, having put out mealworms, she retreated to her car, and was able to watch in comfort while the parents ran a shuttle service until the mealworms were all gone. Sometimes one bird would be in the box, tending the chicks, while the partner was sitting on the fence with the next supply. The adults were seen removing faecal sacks on several occasions – we wonder if all bird parents perform this service to keep the nest clean – some research is necessary here! Finally, both Hoggie and Foxy have been for their evening feed. Hoggie was first again, the fox arriving 10 minutes after (s)he had left having eaten his/her fill. 3-0 to Hoggie
	Sunday 5th May Today we have had the camera on box 2 again and find to our surprise that there are now at least 9 eggs. Although she leaves the nest more than Beauty, Battler is spending much more time there than she used to. However, we watched from 17.13 until 19.00 and during that time she left the box empty between 17.34 and 18.23. In spite of this, her mate is feeding her pretty regularly. He fed her 9 times in the roughly 50 minutes she was in the box, that is once every 5 minutes. Perhaps we've given up on her too soon and she is laying some of her own eggs on top of the existing clutch! Time will tell.
	Our robins continue to develop. According to the robin "bible" (The Life of the Robin, by David Lack), the time between hatching and fledging is very much the same as for blue tits, namely about 14 days. We first saw the robin chicks on April 25th, so they hatched then, or maybe a day or so earlier. This means that by Thursday May 9th we can expect them to fly. The picture was taken this afternoon and it is still not clear how many chicks there are. (Some imagination is needed to decide that this might show robin chicks. The white bits are in fact the edges of their gapes when their beaks are closed. The chicks' eyes are black and directly above them). Is that a fourth chick on the left at the back? (If you click on the picture, you get a bigger version.)
	Monday 6th May Battler looks as though she is laying her own clutch on top of the existing eggs! i-Catcher was in webcam mode today, so we don't have a picture to show you, but at 1 pm Elizabeth noticed that there were now definitely 10 eggs in box 2. Perhaps Battler will end up with chicks after all. Her pattern of comings and goings fits much better with the egg laying phase rather than the incubation phase. As usual now, at the end of the day both our bluetit mums are tucked up for the night.
	Also, we definitely have four robin chicks. In the latest photo you can see four beaks with the white edges from their gapes. Malcolm also went out with a torch when he got home and did a quick visual check. They didn't seem to mind the intrusion. There was no immediate startled reaction to the flash of the camera. They must have got used to our comings and goings in the passageway at the back of the house, which runs a couple of feet from their nest. (Again, if you click on the picture you will get a bigger version. Its size is about 84kb so it should take about 15 seconds to download using a 56kb modem) In the larger version you can clearly see four chick faces looking at the camera. This time you can see the beak and eyes of the chick at the back left. We wonder if the chicks are always in the same relative places? Presumably the toughest, strongest chick gets the best (front?) spot early on, and therefore gets more food and manages to keep it.
	Tuesday 7th May There are now 11 eggs in box 2! Battler is getting serious about sitting and has been on the eggs for most of the morning. However, when she has been away, 11 eggs can clearly be seen. If she carries on like this some eggs would hatch on about 20th May - but how many? And would any of the earlier eggs hatch? Well, whatever happens, its going to make an interesting case study. The first two eggs were already laid when we came back from our holiday on 8th April. There was then a short gap and then eggs 3 to 8 were laid on consecutive mornings from 11th till 17th April. From 18th until 4th May nothing much happened except that more nesting material was brought in and it looked as though a fresh start was being made. Then finally eggs 9, 10 and 11 were laid from 5th to 7th May. It's a pity we can't get a DNA analysis of the eggs to find out their parentage! Of all the years we have been having eggs in our bluetits nest boxes, we have never had un-hatched eggs left in the box except for last year, when two eggs out of a clutch of nine didn't hatch. Six out of the seven that did fledged successfully. One disappeared. Presumably it died very early and its body was removed from the nest by its mother.
	Beauty is now in the middle of her incubation stint. She started, more or less, on 1st May and with luck the chicks will hatch about 14th May. She spends more or less all her time on the eggs, fidgeting and sometimes appearing to be turning them over, presumably to equalise their share of the favourable, warmer positions. The pattern of egg laying was a little odd too. She laid 4 eggs, one each day from 18th April until 21st April. She then took a six day holiday, only laying the last 4 eggs over the five day period from 28th April. Although she started incubation on1st May, her last, the eighth egg, was laid on 2nd May.
	Thursday 9th May Both our bluetits continued sitting yesterday with nothing of note to report. Not that they were getting much of a look in, as the day was one of frantic activity with our robins. We knew the chicks were due to fly today and we were desperately trying to get some decent pictures of them before they did. We tried many things, but finally an upgrade to Windows 2000, i-Catcher and our Panasonic video camera produced some pictures that will help us to remember this important event in their lives. Let us introduce the family. Here is Mum, or at least the more feminine looking bird! She is still looking sweet even after the pressures of the last two weeks. We think this is Dad. He looks more of a regular tough guy. Perhaps he's beginning to think that it wasn't such a good idea after all. Ah well, it'll be all over soon - till the next time!
	The chicks are more difficult to introduce. For the most part, they keep well down in the nest until a food delivery arrives. On the left you can just see three gapes welcoming the latest offering. It continues on the right as the parent lands.
	Food delivered - it's time to go.
	It's getting late - soon the chicks will be left on their own again for their last night in the nest. But before that, there's one last duty for Mum (or is it Dad?) to perform. A faecal sac is removed from the nest. The chicks flew successfully early this morning. Our passageway will be a lonelier place without them!
	Our bluetits are now in the doldrums of the nesting process. Both Beauty and Battler are incubating but the growth of the chicks inside their eggs is not very dramatic looking! In the picture of Battler on the left, you can see how she spreads her wings as she is fed. She does this nearly every time, so this is not a one off event. However, we have never seen Beauty do it which only underlines how different the behaviour and personality of our two birds are. It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that a bluetit is a bluetit is a bluetit..... but anyone who watches them closely can see that each one is different!
	Friday 10th May Hoggie came to visit us again last night, this time at about 4.15 in the morning. Luckily it was i-Catcher and not me that was watching!
	Battler welcoming her mate who is coming with some food! And here's a mealworm brought a little while later.
	Sunday 12th May Incubation continues in both nest boxes. Here Beauty has just come back into the box after a short (comfort?) break. She has a good look at her eggs before settling down again. A few minutes later, her faithful beau brings another food offering.
	Monday 13th May Today has been the wettest day for weeks - and today was the day Beauty's chicks decided to start hatching! At about 5.20 this afternoon, Elizabeth looked at box 1 - and found Beauty eating some egg shell!! She nibbled away at it, and pulled at a stretchy bit (the membrane?), before settling down again.
	Beau, who at this time did not know the chicks had started hatching, brought in a large caterpillar intended for Beauty, which she tried to feed to the little pink wriggly thing who did not even have its mouth open. In the end, she ate it herself, then moved to one side so that we could just see a little gape. A little while later, we saw her eating more shell, but we could not decide whether it was the other half of the first piece, or part of a second shell. You can just make out 2 chicks here, one with its mouth wide open!
This shows the 3rd egg hatching at the top of the clutch. Click on the image for a larger version!	Beau then went into a frenzy of food gathering. Now, as we said earlier, it has been really, really wet today. Our rain gauge has recorded a rainfall of 15mm, that's over half an inch, of rain. But despite this, Beau was averaging between 1½ and 2 minutes between visits and kept this up from the time the first egg hatched until after 8pm. Each delivery was a tiny caterpillar suitable for a chick, not the great beast he delivered to Beauty before he knew the chicks had hatched. He really seems to be an extremely industrious mate.
Here you can see(?) 5 eggs and 3 chicks, two with their beaks wide open! Again, click for a bigger version.	Beau has come in here when Beauty had just popped out for a breather. He doesn't quite know what to do but in the end feeds his offering directly to the chick himself.
	Beau watches while Beauty passes his morsel of food to a chick. He often stays a little while after he has passed his food item to Beauty and takes great interest in what she is doing with it. Is this the bluetit version of Daddy bonding with the kids? Of course, it is warmer and drier in the nest.... It's time for bed. How many chicks will there be tomorrow morning?
	Tuesday 14th May First thing this morning, there were 4 chicks and 4 eggs in box 1. At about half past 11 we saw Beauty and Beau between them disposing of a fifth shell. The first picture shows Beauty picking up the shell.
	As Beau comes in with some food, she flicks it away and it lands just below the middle of the second picture. It is the white blob you can see there.
	When Beau has passed the food to Beauty, he picks up the shell and takes it outside to dispose of it. The robins are still working hard to feed the family. Whenever one of us goes out of the back door, a robin comes down, hoping for more mealworms – and usually getting some. A family of starlings is in the garden – two adults and three young, making quite a racket. They can demolish a slice of wholemeal bread in no time at all. Elizabeth bought two loaves at a discount when she last went shopping, but at the present rate they will not last for long. Unfortunately they also enjoy the porridge oats, grated cheese and finely chopped peanuts put out for the song thrush which visits regularly. The squirrels tend to monopolise the ground feeders too. We have tried treating the food for the ground feeders with capsicum pepper dust, but the squirrels have not read the various articles that say they hate this food additive – they appear to munch away regardless.
Click on this for a bigger picture. Six chicks & two eggs?	We went out for the day at 11.30 this morning, so we left the camera in webcam mode. When we returned about 6 hours later, we immediately turned on the TV and saw at least 5 chicks. It’s impossible to make an exact count at the moment, as they form a wriggling pink mass. We have seen 2 eggs still, but there could be more as the nest cup is very deep. The camera is now back on “catching” mode, so we might be able to give a more accurate count later. We have now started to provide mealworms in the special feeder – the mealworms will be too big for the chicks at the moment, but hopefully (when they discover it) will provide sustenance for the parents, giving them more time to look for food for the chicks. The male is working really hard and is bringing food in regularly – we watched him searching carefully in the hornbeam tree where the box is, but although he searched with painstaking thoroughness, he could not find sufficient there for his chicks. He flew round to the side of the house, where there are a couple of old oak trees and returned shortly after with a supply of food. When he left he searched in an adjacent silver birch, but did not seem to have much luck there either. At the end of the bluetit day, we think that there are 6 chicks and 2 eggs left to hatch. We are very relieved, as after the first four eggs there was a gap of six days before the last four were laid. Battler in box 2 is still incubating steadfastly. Perhaps there is hope for the first 8 eggs in her nest?
Beauty hears Beau calling. She promptly leaves the nest.	Wednesday 15th May Well, we still think there are 6 chicks. Certainly there are at least two eggs un-hatched, and it is unlikely that they will hatch now. Beau is proving a most diligent Dad. He brings all the food, when Beauty leaves the nest she does not bring anything back for her chicks. She must have all her work cut out in obtaining enough food for her own needs, bearing in mind the short amount of time she is away from the nest. She no longer eats any of the food collected by Beau, she feeds it all to her sometimes reluctant brood. Most of the time Beau comes into the nest with food, he passes it to Beauty who feeds it to the chicks. Although to start with Beau sometimes used to stay to watch, he rarely does so now, leaving immediately he has passed the food to Beauty. Sometimes, however, we see a different sequence of events. First Beau signals that he is coming by chirping outside the nest. On hearing this, Beauty gets out of the nest cup and promptly leaves the nest. Beau enters, usually with a large green caterpillar (LGC), and attempts to find a willing throat to thrust it down. This is often somewhat difficult and can take from 30secs to well over a minute to achieve. He then waits a bit more to see if the chick has anything to give him in return (ie a faecal sac!) and then leaves. Sometimes he will have time to come back once or twice more before Beauty returns, but generally not. The images alongside show a typical sequence. You can see that Beau does not find his brood fighting for the food. Apparently, he has stuffed them so full that they would prefer to sleep on it. You can also still see the two un-hatched eggs.
Beau enters with a LGC.	Over three minutes later, Dad departs
Mum returns directly after and settles down to brood again.	Beauty does not bring any food with her. Presumably she has been foraging for food for herself.
	Battler is still incubating. Our estimate of the date of her eggs hatching is in four days time on 20th May.