6 Mar 23 — Mating on the ledge
Tom and Azina mating on the ledge this morning. A different view, from the fixed camera. Azina instigated that one, but it took Tom some time to get the message.
Azina laid her third egg at 5.52 this morning, with Tom in attendance. She’d just got up at 5.45 when Tom arrived in the box with food. They have a chat then she gets into position at 5.51, pushes at 5.52 and lifts up at 5.53. Effortless 🙂 Tom then leaves, leaving the food behind, and Azina settles down.
She then sat tight on the eggs for hours, not revealing all three until 9:10 a.m. The new egg is the one at the back. The first one is on the right and the second one on the left.

A day of exchanges, food offerings, egg keeping. I saw them mate this morning and witnessed a food pass late afternoon. Azina refused the pigeon offered when on the ledge but accepted it in the air and went to eat it on the roof of Muscal House (that block of flats she’s taken a shine to).
I am expecting the third egg sometime in the night: around 4:30 if she keeps to the same schedule as the second egg (60 hours) or before (last year it took 57 hours so it could be as early at 1:30). Time will tell. She is currently in the box, on the eggs, after her dinner, which took about an hour.
I think it is fair to say that the last egg is not going to hatch now. Looking back at shots from egg-laying time I think this was egg #2 that didn’t hatch. The colour contrast between the brightly coloured freshly laid eggs and now is quite big. All this rolling on gravel does wear them out.
But we have three healthy chicks. And the little one is no push-over!
The Peregrines day started early with Tom bringing food at 4:37 a.m. Azina fed it to the chicks but I am not sure how much they could see each other at first as it looked a bit tentative.
Then at 5:47 Tom came in and had a long discussion with Azina. He really went into her face at times!
Tom fed the chicks this morning and did a very good job of it. Azina has let him be a hands-on Dad a fair bit this time. She left him in charge for nearly an hour in the morning and in the afternoon.

The oldest chick has started to do a little bit of preening.
The chicks got 6 feeds today, at 4:37, 7:04 (by Tom), 11:20, 2:41pm, 4:56pm and 7:17pm. A mix of Starling and Pigeon again.

Shots for today:
Chick #3 is making attempts at standing up. Chick #1 is almost a pro at it. Chick #2 doesn’t seem in too much of a hurry.

Again they’ve spent most of the day sleeping. On their own. Azina paid them a few visits but was more a disturbance than anything, unless she brought food 😉

Food was again just pigeon and there were 6 feeds, by both Azina and Tom.

Feathers are starting to break and this is now the best way to distinguish between the three chicks.

Shots for today:
Today is P6T’s five weeks birthday!

He’s had a great day full of running around and flapping, with plenty of resting and preening in between. He can sprint along the runway at a fair speed! And does it sometimes while flapping (clip below for example).
He also pancaked on the wall for the first time, which means he now feels very confident on it.

He again spent the night out on the wall, in the same spot at the night before. He hasn’t been in the box since Monday unless going after a parent. Which has given Tom the opportunity to go and do a bit of housekeeping in there. It’s needed!
Name. A few people have asked if I’m going to name him. To be honest I am quite happy calling him P6T (it’s easy to say, which is usually my criterion for giving a name) and I haven’t been inspired so far. Maybe something will come during fledging but for now I will stick to it.
Funny clip to finish with before today’s album:
Today’s shots:
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: