Nesting season 2001
Broad Street, Guildford, UK.
Page six.
17th May 2001. Thursday. Today, five of the nine eggs in box 1 have hatched. We spent the day in Oxford, driving up the M40 in driving rain and 8 degree Celsius temperatures. There was a strong northerly wind blowing rain straight into the nest box hole. When we returned (at 5pm), the pair of birds were very busy, dropping seamlessly into their feeding routine.
Hatchlings and eggs
A census of feeding activity from 18:00 BST until 20:00 BST showed the male bringing food every ten minutes, and feeding the hatchlings himself if the female was absent. The female spent much of her time keeping the naked and blind youngsters warm. In the previous few days she had been spending much time scratching, and vigorously attacking her heebie-jeebies with her beak and claws. Today, however, all this is forgotten and she is getting on with the task.
Here is a sequence of pictures to show a feeding event.
The male approaches; the female displays.
The male enters, with caterpillar.
The male presents his trophy.
The caterpillar changes beaks.
The female attempts to feed small mouths.
The male and female tear the caterpillar apart
Eventually, the female was reduced to eating the caterpillar and regurgitating part of it for the small beaks. Here is a detailed shot of the nest cup.
Five chicks and four eggs
The oak leaves are well developed (compare earlier picture on page four) and there seems to be a plentiful supply of food, even though the weather is cold, wet, and foul.
Oak leaves- 17th May 2001.
After the (doubtless) exhausting day's work, the female fluffs herself up and goes straight off to sleep, fidgeting far less than on the previous nights.
Female asleep on hatchlings at 8:30pm
As science is all about prediction, as well as observation and explanation, we hazard a guess that no more of these eggs will hatch tomorrow...they are probably infertile. Our bird has been turning the eggs, but not in any greatly systematic way, and she has spent long periods away from the nest cup. They may have got too cold. The male seems to be calmly supportive.
Addendum: we were wrong! all the other eggs hatched, see ->
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There are many pictures of the kind of activity now proceeding, on the pages from earlier years. Please see the links on the page "Old birdsite" below.
Old birdsite http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/D.Jefferies/bird/birdsite.html
Lifeforms pictures http://www.eryptick.net/lifeforms.htm
Email dj@eryptick.net
diary continues......