16 May 23 — Lucky escape!
Dramatic scene at the hospital this morning! If you look very closely the pigeon gets away from Tom and will have learned not to play with fire hopefully!
Today was a light day for Tom incubation wise but it was not for lack of trying! This was his last try for the day, around 7pm, but Azina didn’t want to budge 😉
The chicks ended spending a fair bit of time on the ledge this afternoon and had two meals back to back out of the box. Tom had fed them for about 20 minutes. Less than 10 minutes later Azina arrived with more food. At first the chicks didn’t seem interested but one by one got more food and that feed lasted 40 minutes!
If you’re on facebook that double feed was during a long Live session.

There was variety on the menu again today with pigeon, starling and blackbird. Tom fed the chicks three times and Azina three times too. Very well fed kids!

Chick #1’s back is looking even more like a pincushion and Chick #2’s back has started. It’s somehow clearer in the night mode shots.

Chick #3 is still making real efforts to stand up and Chick #2 is getting better at it.

Shots for today:
Happy 4 weeks birthday to Chick #1!
I forgot to mention yesterday that it was starting to mantle prey after grabbing it from a parent. It’s done it again twice today. 😉

It’s also been ‘weird’ and sleeping sitting up on its own on the ledge while its siblings were pancaked in the nest box. I don’t remember a chick doing that before.

It rained all night but the day was dry so they went out to exercise a few times but they spent most of their time inside.

They were fed five times, four times by Azina and once by Tom. All feeds lasted around 25 minutes and all feeds consisted of pigeon.
Chick #3 has now caught up with its siblings in size; no more tiny one in the middle. And it looks like it’s growing bigger, bigger than Chick #1 for sure. It could be all the down giving a false impression but probably not…

The chicks will be ringed on Friday morning.
Shots for today:
Around 4pm Tom brought in a Collared Dove. He quickly took it away since Azina wasn’t interested in grabbing it.
This is the first time I record one as prey here. I have not seen one in Fulham (or Hammersmith) yet. I suspect he may have caught it in Barnes, and even there I don’t know that they are that common.

A few shots from today.
There was an intruder near 3pm, a female I presume as Azina shot out of the box and used the hospital to gain height quickly to chase it over the cemetery. Tom was around and immediately went to incubate. Azina relieved him 10 minutes later.
Apart from this it was a quiet day. Azina ended up doing 14hr22m on the trot overnight. Tom had an easy day today, with only 2hr28m.
Azina was eager for the food Tom brought her this evening. She really rushed towards Tom!A few intruders again today (one seemed to be a juvenile but it was from quite a distance) but that didn’t disturb Tom and Azina’s incubation routine much.
One clip where Tom has to do a lot of begging.
And a few shots from today.