Another update

 

Another update on our two swift families. The new pair who have taken up residence in Box 1 have been busy furnishing their new home. In fact they have laid a ‘carpet’ of feathers as can be seen in this photo:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And in the video below you can see that one of the pair is re-arranging the ‘carpet’ into a nest of sorts and sticking down the loose feathers. They definitely look like they’re in for the long haul and will be back next year!

 

 

Meanwhile, in Box 3 the youngsters continue to grow. Unfortunately there has been no more sign of anyone visiting Box 6 which is disappointing.

 

 

 

 

One's gone missing!

 

Here’s the latest video of our young swifts in Box 3. This time one of them is doing ‘press-ups’ in readiness for fledging, which we estimate should be around 30^th July, so a little while to go yet. But look more carefully and you will see that there are only two youngsters in the nest now.... 

 

 

We don’t know what’s happened to the third one. Everything was fine last time we looked which was only a day or so ago. We’ve checked the gutters below and around the nest box, and also the ground and garden in general and there’s no sign at all. So we are completely baffled as it was very much alive and well before. It’s possible that it’s still in the box, in the corner underneath the camera but of course we’re unable to see without disturbing the other birds, so we’ll just have to wait and see if it does reappear.

The second video shows the parent bird coming in to feed and the absolute pandemonium in the box as the two youngsters compete for attention! 

 

On a good note, the pair in Box 1 are well settled now, and laid another egg which will go to waste but at least they’re trying. And Box 6 has had prospectors this morning, with one taking up residence for a while so we are hopeful that maybe it will visit again with a partner. Apologies but I can't figure out how to get rid of the pink "tart's boudoir" effect in Box 6, but never mind, you can see that the visitor is having a good look around this very desireable home!

 

 

Growing fast!

A quick update on our little family in Box 3. As in previous years, one of the parents has now stopped coming into the box and roosting with the youngsters or visiting during the day so the three young are now being looked after by a single parent. Again. Has the other parent been taken by a predator, or has it simply got fed up with bawling kids? We think the missing parent is our 'Stumpy' as the remaining one has a full tail. Anyway, they're growing well now and looking fit and healthy, here's the latest video:

 

 

 

 

Another egg....

 

Here’s another video of our growing family of young swifts in Box 3 - not much to see here as they’re having a nap. 

 

 Meanwhile, in box 1 there has been a development - a few feathers have been fashioned into half a nest and the pair are obviously having a trial run because there’s now an egg in the corner. As per usual with first year birds nothing will come of this but we’re hopeful that next year they will come back and do it properly!

 

 

Too hot for brooding.!

 

It’s so hot here today that the parent bird is not sitting on the chicks at all, so here’s another video of them in the nest. They are growing fast, must be the heat!

 

 

We now have 3 chicks!

 

A quick update - we were able to get a video this morning which shows that we now have 3 chicks in the nest.

A new baby!

 

We have a baby swift! We think it may have been there for the last couple of days, as it’s been impossible to see so far, but we could tell that there was something there by the way the parent bird was sitting. Instead of being sunk down into the nest it was hunched up a bit, a sure sign that it is brooding a chick. So here’s a video from this morning, you can get a brief glimpse of the chick on the right hand side of the nest, and the empty egg shell on the floor of the box. Not sure if there’s a second or third chick yet, but hopefully we shall see shortly. Notice also the rather large black feathers lining the nest...we think this is from “Stumpy’s” missing tail!

The new pair in Box 1 continue to use the box day and night and fly around in a threesome with one of our pair in Box 3, so we are very hopeful that they will return next year to breed.

 

 

 

 

Exciting news!

 

Our exciting news is that we’ve had a couple of prospectors over the last few days, practising approaches to box 1, so we were hopeful that they might actually enter it. They did so on Thursday, and then one roosted overnight on Friday. Last night they were both in, and here’s a video of them this morning (Sunday). They look to be fairly settled, so we live in hope that they will start nest building and return next year to breed.

 

 

Just over a week to go!

 

Incubation takes around 19-21 days, so we expect our swifts’ eggs to hatch somewhere around the 18^th June, so just over a week to go. “Stumpy” is still flying with other swifts in the neighbourhood and all seems well at the moment.

Still flying about

 Our tail-less swift is still flying about, seemingly with no trouble at all and managing to keep up with the other swifts in the neighbourhood. Here's a picture taken yesterday, out on the reserve. He's been out again today as well. He's been nicknamed "Stumpy"!

 

Everything seems OK

Well, our tail-less swift seems to be getting on alright so far, it's managing to get in and out of the box no problem and flying about as usual. We managed to get a photo of it on one of it's flights:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not sure how long it's going to take to grow another tail, it could be some weeks yet but so far so good!

Disaster?

Well, we don't know if this is a disaster or not, but last night we noticed that one of the swifts tails is completely missing! What's happened, has it has a punch-up with another swift, has it been attacked by a predator of some sort? We just don't know. Obviously it managed to get itself back into the box last night but this is obviously going to make it less agile until the tail re-grows, so it's a huge worry while they're still sitting on unhatched eggs.

Over the last couple of days there has a been a party of four or more prospectors hanging around early morning. None have entered any of the other nestboxes but at least they're showing some interest so we live in hope! Here's a short video of the tail-less Jonathan...or is it Taylor?

 

Another egg

Our swifts appeared to be incubating for the last couple of days but we were unsure as to whether there was a third egg in there. This morning they went out for a brief fly about and we were able to see that there are three now, so that's good news, and they're all in the nest where they should be!

Another egg

This morning the swifts laid another egg, thankfully in the nest this time. They've now gone out on their daily forage, so here's a picture of the proceedings so far. We now await egg number three!

 

We have an egg

 Yesterday evening we discovered that our pair had laid an egg. Hooray! But...they had laid it outside the nest cup as you can see in this video:

 So, action had to be taken this morning. Which involves first checking that the swifts are out on their morning foray, and then Steve hanging out of the upstairs window next to the box with me hanging onto his trouser belt whilst he replaces the egg in the nest. We barely had time to do this and close the window again - literally five minutes or so - before our pair were back and in the box. Here they are happily settled down again on their one egg:

 

Hopefully we'll have more news on more eggs over the next couple of days.
 

We now have a pair!

Our second swift arrived this week, and started to roost in Box 3 on the 12th with our first one, so we now have a pair. Still no sign of any more swifts visiting our boxes though, although we live in hope...Here's a photo from last night's roost:

 

First Swift arrived

 Last night our first swift came home
to roost in Box 3, hooray. 3rd of May, the earliest that they've arrived with us, normally it's some time after the 5th May. We await the arrival of it's partner, hopefully very soon!