The end of March and the Great tits have
produced a fair nest. All that's needed now is the finishing
touches, and this bundle of hair from the horse field across the
road will do nicely.
27th March and the first egg is laid in
bird box 1
The First of April and the count is 6 eggs
13th of April and unlucky for us we are
suffering equipment problems. These cameras have worked faultlessly
for two years and the moment we get too this stage of a nest 10 eggs
laid incubation started, and one camera packs up and another
experiences interference. Still it will do for now, at least we get
some picture, even if it keeps going in to auto focus.
16th of April and the first egg hatches
just after 12.45. Mum immediately shoots out to find something for
the chick to eat.
The nest just over an hour later and
another chick emerges
16th April at 6.45pm and we have four chicks
The following morning, and one unfortunate
chick appears to have died, Mum takes it out of the nest
The 18th April and there are chicks galore,
both parents doing a sterling job of keeping the ever hungry chicks
happy
The scene later that day, and with only
two eggs still to hatch, we have to assume there are now seven
chicks
Just look at the dedication of these two
Typical The cameras work perfectly all
year!!, then just when the best bit starts, they pack up :( The overhead
camera has just died, so we will have to rely on the two side
cameras, fingers crossed.
Just four days later and they look like this
A week later and now they are this big,
putting great demands on the parent birds to find food. Luckily for
our birds they only have to go as far as the mealworm feeder and
fresh food is on hand.
You can see in this photo, that the
chest feathers have almost completely joined together on this
chick
End of the month and they are starting to
look like mum and dad .
meanwhile nest box two has a pair of blue
tits starting a nest
The male unusually has taken to roosting in
the nest at night, this is the female taking out he's droppings in
the morning.
Perhaps she is telling him off in this
picture, (don't do it again)
The male often sits in the nest cup waiting
for her arrival
Trying he's luck to see if she is ready to
mate
You could be fooled into thinking there is
an egg in this picture but its just a feather
April 13 and she lays her first egg, and
seems somewhat surprised by the arrival
This is a video of the first egg being laid
and the few moments after.
April 14 and she lays her second egg
Dad still tries he's trick of sitting in the
nest cup, when she arrives with a bundle of fluff.
April 18 and she lays her sixth egg, and
seems to have spent some of the day sitting on them despite the
quite warm weather. We still think there are more to come.
The weather is very hot and the incubating
has started on the now 10 eggs. Here you can see she is panting to
keep cool whilst still maintaining the temperature of the eggs
The next day and its quite cold and windy
so she has hunkered down and fluffed up her plumage to keep the same
temperature for the eggs
Dad is quite devoted and maintains a steady
supply of food for her while she is brooding
