As one chick is considerably larger, so could be female, we have decided she should be Gaia and the small male chick Pluto. Apologies to those who voted for Venus…. actually, the difference in size between them is more than could be accounted for simply by gender. I’m not sure whether Gaia is just a greedy monster or Pluto a weedy strapling, but both seem to be eating very well, so I’m not really concerned.
There was another milestone reached today at three weeks. Xavier brought in a starling, which was feeding to Pluto with Gaia looking on. When she decided to join the others, Xavier dropped the prey (which was barely prepared) and let them have a go at self-feeding, which they did, with some limited success. Here is a video of that event:
Interestingly, Diamond has also brought in TWO starlings this week. I can only assume that prey availability is a bit light…..tough times for peregrines where a female falcon will stoop to (pun intended) a starling!
I’ll put up my report on the talk on Monday as I my slide reader is not functioning, alas.
We are hoping for a few showers tonight, possibly a thunderstorm. We’ve had a few spits this afternoon, but nothing much.
Thunderstorms, yes, two ones during the night. Gaia, Pluto and Eggsy were very brave, keeping sleeping. Diamond went inside the scrape !
Thanks for this update, Cilla
That was quite a storm. I hope it didn’t start any fires. Diamond (what a lovely mum) stood protectively over Eggsy, who is looking rather second-hand now.
Diamond may have had to resort to the odd starling or two, but Xavier seems to be excelling at not-a-starlings at the moment – he’s brought in a couple of whoppers lately. He doesn’t appear to have grown, but he must be getting stronger! And speaking of growth – Diamond seems to be having her annual breeding season shrinkage, and is looking very sleek and streamlined at the moment.