Saturday in Bird World

4 May 2024

Good Morning Everyone,

I thought I would return to normal on Friday, but it did not turn out that way. Despite feeling dizzy and still rather weak, I forced myself to go for a half-hour walk in the park just after some rain so I would not be around anyone. Everything is so green, and the rain that we have had for the past three days has been so welcome. I owe many of you responses, and I will get there – this is just taking a lot longer to overcome than I ever imagined. It is entirely possible that there will not be another blog to go out until Monday – in the hope that another day of absolute quiet and Geemeff’s peppermint tea and saltines will save me.

Hugo Yugo is trying hard to be good.

‘H’ is giving us a smile for the day.

At 10:47 on Friday, the New Guy at the Hellcat Canyon nest of Iris kicked the first egg out of the nest. Don’t let anyone tell you male ospreys can’t count!

Annie and Archie’s chicks are getting their pin feathers! Can you believe it?

A remarks, “Watching the 11am feeding from Cal Falcons (3 May), mum works incredibly hard, circling the chicks to take up feeding from a different angle to reach different beaks. Around 11:17:30, the piece she is feeding them runs out, and even after checking her talons, she has nothing further to give. As she checks the group of chicks in front of her, one grabs at her beak, indicating it is still hungry. (The youngest was at the back, though it leapt valiantly over its siblings to get bites and seemed to be doing relatively well, especially after one of its older siblings face-planted in a food coma and removed one of the obstacles to mum’s beak. 

But Annie circles the chicks and around the front of the scrape, 180 degrees around the group to the other side, she finds a decent chunk of food, which she proceeds to feed to the chicks who had previously been at the back of the group. She concentrates primarily on the two younger chicks. As is usual with Annie’s feedings, everyone has a crop by the end of the meal. This piece of prey started off as the body of a largish pigeon, I think, minus the head and legs. These four have demolished it. Poor little Archie must be absolutely exhausted. He is hunting up a storm for this lot, and I can only hope he keeps it up. There’s still such a long way to go if these two are to raise these four and then teach them to hunt. I can only imagine that learning to hunt as a peregrine is a very difficult and exacting task. Mistakes could be fatal. Indeed, I often wonder how parents teach fledglings to dive at speed at a prey bird and hit it at the right speed and angle to kill it without injuring themselves. They don’t eat carrion like eagles, so cannot scavenge or steal food to survive, leaving them with only their parents to rely on until they can perfect a particularly difficult hunting style.”

Annie and Grinnell’s grandchildren get tucked under their daughter, Larry.

‘B’ sent us an article about the new streaming cam for Larry! Thanks, ‘B’.

The chicks are hungry at San Jose City Hall’s scrape of Monty and Hartley.

Oren and Ruth have three hatches at their Syracuse University RTH nest and they are so cute.

Arthur has the Cornell nest he shares with Big Red full of prey, too. I could see chipmunks, voles, squirrels, and birds. The two chicks are getting their pin feathers and it does seem those other two eggs are Dudleys.

Diane and Jack have the second egg of the second clutch on Friday at Achieva.

For French Osprey fans, the first osprey of the 2024 season hatched on Friday!

Louis really likes bringing huge sticks to the Loch Arkaig nest 2.

Bradley still loves his Puffers. Thank you, Bradley, for bringing them to the nest to eat!

At Loch of the Lowes, Blue NCO left to eat. Another osprey landed on the perch. It is unclear if it is Laddie or a stranger.

Gorgeous Tuffy.

Stella and her one surviving chick are hanging in there at the University of Florida-Gainesville. R reports that Poor little Middle is reported to have died around 0200 the other day. Stella looks down at her healthy baby in some disbelief. Her whole season has gone up in flames so to speak.

All three eaglets at Little Miami Conservancy are doing fantastic. The older two are really getting their juvenile plumage while you can see the baby has all of its thermal down (in the back).

Thanks, ‘A’ for stepping in and bringing us some good news form Sydney’s Olympic Forest: “Lady and Dad are not just doing a lot of nest building at Olympic Park in Sydney – they are also mating regularly, and have been doing so for at least a week. Here are the ranger’s reports for the past four days (and who might the ‘third eagle’ be?): May1: Both spent the night by the nest, and Lady came in early when disturbed by a possum passing up the tree. Dad joined her then with an early duet and mating. Both left around 6:30am and returned with sticks. Just after 9am, duets were heard again. They both brought in a few sticks during the morning. Then Dad sat by the nest alone for about an hour, before leaving at 11:20am. Both were then away for the day – somewhere – until Dad returned at 3:26pm with a stick. A very windy afternoon at the nest. Dad brought another stick shortly after and we could hear calls – but could not see the eagles. At 5:10pm, no eagles  were seen at the river. At dark, neither eagle had returned home. Dad brought seven sticks today and Lady brought four.

May2: Neither eagle was at the nest last night. A Powerful Owl was head calling in the distance a few times. Eagles were reported at Burns Bay from yesterday afternoon. They were seen soaring and circling over Linley Point in the afternoon and honking early there this morning. At 8:10am an eagle was seen in the Goat Island area flying west up the harbour. Just before 11am, two eagles were reported at Goat Island. And at 14:06pm, we saw a picture of three eagles soaring overhead there. A little later, at 16:10pm, one eagle was seen heading west, but an hour later, none was seen on the river. Then at last light, both Lady and Dad appeared on the nest – moved a stick or two, sat side by side on the branch and then settled for the night.

May 3: Eagles were home last night by the nest. Lady was disturbed early by a possum. Then we heard an early morning duet. Both were then off. Dad returned with sticks over the next hour or two, Lady with just a few. Duets were heard off nest around 7am. Then more sticks and leafy branches coming in and both chewing in the nest bowl. Mating again at 9:29am. At 9:45am, both were off, and were noted down on the river an hour later – one on River Roost, the other on Mangrove Island. At 11:08am, both flew off to the east, then at 11:23am, two eagles were at Goat Island. Rain was steady again in the afternoon. At 15:34pm, one of the eagles caught a good-sized fish. At dark, they could not be seen at Goat Island – so where are they?

May 4: The eagles were away last night, possibly at Goat Island, where they were seen at 11:20am – with a duet heard as well. Then, just before 4pm, Dad showed up at the nest, while Lady was seen at River Roost at 4:25pm. She headed off to the nest soon after and joined Dad. He started bringing in sticks then, and there was a mating at 16:49pm. He brought six sticks in before dark and she brought two. They both then settled for the night close by.

Now this really is early. Surely they are not planning to lay eggs in the dead of winter. The winter solstice is not until 21/22 June for heaven’s sake – which is still over six weeks away – so surely not. Surely they are just enjoying a little quiet grown-up time, yes? They’re not considering producing eggs for a good while yet I presume. 

Great, though, to know that they’re together and doing well. Obviously, they spend the whole year together, roosting and hunting and generally behaving as a couple. That’s so sweet. I often wonder whether the storks and ospreys who migrate ever really get to know each other at all, let alone the albatrosses, whose total lifetime of interactions might add up to less than a day when you think about it. Which I hadn’t until now. “

We need a proactive approach to power lines if our ospreys and other raptors are to be saved. Thanks, Geemeff!

Thank you so much for being with us this morning and for all your well wishes! It is appreciated.

Thank you to the following or their notes, posts, videos, articles, and streaming cams that helped me to write my post this morning: ‘A, B, Geemeff, H, PB, R, SK’, Montana Osprey Project, Cal Falcons, USParks Service Alcatraz, SK Hideaways, The Mercury News, SU Hawk Cam, Cornell RTH, Heidi McGrue, Sylvain Larzilliere, Geemeff, PLO, Scottish Wildlife Trust (LOTL), Moorings Park Ospreys, UFlorida-Gainesville, Little Miami Conservancy, Sea Eagle Cam, and The Wildlife Society.