Monday 8 April: “Surprising what you find when you aren’t looking! The robin startled me when it flew out as I was rummaging for a pot but all seems fine and the parents are back on the nest,” reports an LHS member.
Update Friday + 5 days: “Now we have three bald, blind hatchlings plus an egg which probably won’t hatch.”
Update Monday + 8 days: “Still three blind chicks but now downy and demanding full time food service. The dead egg still in the nest. One chick is demanding (and probably getting) more than its share of the grub (literally!). It pops up its head with wide open beak at the slightest sound.Interesting to see whether it kicks the weaker ones out in due course if food runs short. Parents working hard to keep up – including box moth caterpillars …. so a bit of natural control there.”
Update Monday + 15 days: “It may have been fox, cat or squirrels but I suspect the magpies since the nest was more or less intact, albeit on the ground. Still, the mother survives to try again – maybe this year?”
Nature, red in tooth and claw