14 May 2024
Good Morning Everyone,
The squirrels were busy this morning loading up with nuts. Little Red has made his home in the wood bin and can scurry back and forth very quickly from the feeder to his cache.
There are still a few European Starlings that come for suet or to eat off the seed cylinder but only three or four compared to the original twenty-eight.
If I told you I put on my lightweight winter jacket and toque for my walk on Monday, would you believe me? The temperature dropped! The nice thing was that the ducks and geese were in the water or eating grass instead of trying to stay cool on the little islands in the pond.
It was so nice to see so many wood ducks back at the pond. Many of the females were incubating eggs while the males were out foraging. Someone had brought seed for them, too.
Things are really starting to pick up at the osprey nests. Our heads are going to start spinning like an old LP shortly! I am checking on a few of the nests to see what is happening and how close we are to pip or hatch watch. Today I am just running through some of the nests.
Hellgate Canyon: Dr Greene and his team have a list of four names for Iris’s new mate! Please vote on your favourite.
Dunrovin: Swoop and Winnie have their first egg on Monday 13 May at 0654. Swoop was right there giving support to his new mate.
Captiva: The fishing line was removed and they commented that there was a really large hook on the end!
Here is the video WingsofWhimsy made. It is 27 minutes long but you get to see how anxious the adults were for their chicks and what was happening on the nest.
Rutland Manton Bay: Blue 33 and Maya will have one healthy Bob this year. The time has passed for the other remaining egg in the nest to hatch. Some of you will recall that Maya was ill shortly after her return from migration, and many worried we would lose her. I am happy for one healthy chick and one healthy Mum!
Dyfi Osprey Project: Telyn having a nice nap before those eggs hatch and she is a very busy Mum. 12, 15, and 18 of April. Four to five days away from Pip.
Glaslyn: Elen incubating in the rain. Eggs 22, 25, and 28 of April – two weeks away for Aran and Elen.
Loch of the Lowes: The latest news:
Loch Arkaig: Dorcha reminds me so much of Mrs G. Eggs 14, 17, and 20 of April. Six days away til pip watch.
Alyth SS substation: Harry and Flo are doing fantastic. Eggs 15, 18, 21 April. So we are 29 days for the first egg today. Still a week to go.
Poole Harbour: CJ7 and Blue 022. Eggs were 15, 18, 21, and 24 – yes, there are four of them – of April. A week away. You can see we are really going to be busy next week with all these hatches! Really raining here.
There is another very tearful moment when Blue 22 sees his daughter 5H1 land after two years from when she fledged! How amazing and wonderful news for Poole Harbour.
Clark PUD: Eggs were 7, 10, and 13 of April. We are on hatch watch!
Cowlitz PUD: 18, 21, and 24 of April. More than a week to go.
Bundstiftung Goitzsche-Wildnis: Eggs laid on 9, 12, and 15 of April. We are on hatch watch!
Moorings Park: Ruffie and Tuffy are doing fabulous.
Patchogue: MP found some funny moments with these adults and the two new chicks. “08:42AM. The chick wasn’t getting fed so when the other chick turned away and mom was handing the food to them the second chick grabbed hold of the food and mom’s beak and was lifted up into the air. Feisty little one.”
The slope that PSEG created when they tipped that nest upside down is causing difficulties for Mum to stand stable and feed the chicks.
Lake Murray: The third hatch had a crop a couple of times on Monday, but was shut out of some feedings. The two older osplets need more food than the little one, but this little one continues to worry me. I want to be wrong. ‘H’ also reports: “I was only able to watch the last two meals. 12 bites at the 1840 meal, and 0 at the 1916 meal. What a shame.”
‘H’ reports first thing this morning: “5/14, 0619 Kenny delivered a very small partial fish to the nest for breakfast. It was only a five minute feeding, and the typically cantankerous older siblings were both in a good mood! Little ate 24 bites of fish, and there were no attacks on Little. It seems as though Big and Middle don’t have the energy to be uncooperative first thing in the morning.”
Maryland Western Shore Old Town Home: The trio seem to be doing alright!
Barnegat Light: ‘H’ reports: “It looks like Daisy and Duke at Barnegat Light will not have chicks this year. Just in the past several days, they are not mating (that we see) or improving the nest. They mostly hang out on the beach together.”
Jackie and Shadow make me smile.
Fledging is in the offing at Johnson City-ETSU. Sara A caught it on video!
Big Red and Arthur are doing fantastic. I am so glad that with her leg injury there were only two babies this year.
The Cal Falcons continue to provide our daily dose of cute and happiness.
Just look at how fast those San Jose falcons are doing. Monty and Hartley can handle one – or four! Yeah to these second year parents.
Bowling Green has four flacon babies, too.
Jeff Kear posted this wonderful article that goes back to the beginning of the 20th century with the UK Ospreys. Good read regardless of where you live. Where the birds chose to build their nests was quite interesting: “There were nests to be seen placed in every available situation, some on the top of withered maples, some in the thick vines and creepers that clung round their stems, while others (so favourably have the birds been protected) were placed flat upon the ground, more especially on the beach, where the piles of sticks rose, in one instance at least, to some five feet in height. The favourite situation for ground-nests was a narrow strip of beach separated from the rest of the island by a stretch of marsh (vide Fig. 1). Here we counted no less than four nests in half a mile or so. One nest, presumably inhabited the year before, was built upon the top of a shed.”
Beautiful storklets to give you a smile.
Thank you so much for being with me today. Take care all. See you soon!
Thank you to the following for their notes, posts, videos, articles, and streaming cams that helped me to write my post this morning: ‘AE, A, Geemeff, H, MP’, Dunrovin Ranch, Window to Wildlife, Wings of Whimsey, LRWT, Dyfi Osprey Project, Bywyd Gwylld Glaslyn, Scottish Wildlife Trust (LOTL), The Woodland Trust, Alyth SS, Poole Harbour Ospreys, Birds of Poole Harbour, Clark PUD, Cowlitz PUD, BUND Goitsche-Wildnis, Moorings Park Ospreys, PSEG, Lake Murray Ospreys, Maryland Western Shore Old Town Home, Wildlife Conservancy of NJ, SK Hideaways, Sara A, Cornell RTH, BirdGuides, and Bocian Czarny Online.
