Diamond is starting to spend more and more time in the box and standing right in the scrape. Her backside is starting to look a bit ‘fluffy’ , so it shouldn’t be more than a few days now.
Xavier is still bringing in much scorned starlings, but also a bit of variety with parrots and pigeons. Here Diamond on the right is sporting a pigeon ‘crop’ (the bulge in her neck). This shot is a good one to show the difference between the male (Xavier) who is considerably smaller (about 15%) and has more intense, orange-y, feet, beak and eyerings. Diamond’s colouring is more of a lemon yellow and she is of stouter build with thicker legs. She also has more spots on her chest, but these not clear on this image.
Our ‘floater’ peregrine (assuming that it is the same one) has been around again and managed to actually frighten Xavier off the tower and break up a mating. See the videos: the first shows our pair’s reactions to the intrusion and the second the action on and around the tower.