!!! 3 hatchlings! Resident adult male - Black 43 over M still on site.
May 27, 2011 - Scarborough - Yellow Pages
Mark Nash Reports:
May 27th - 2011
To days visit yielded some very good news indeed! For a few seconds at first glance my heart sunk as there were no eggs visible and an empty bowl on the ledge, and neither of the resident adults were seen. Moments later from under the overhang a white flash appeared, and then a second flash. Changing angles to the other side of the ledge and it seemed that all three hatchlings appeared to just spill out of nowhere!
Both of the resident adults were absent and no where to be seen. Several minutes after our arrival, both resident adults seem to came out of thin air and it was quite obvious that we were not welcomed. Surprisingly, the adult male was far more aggressive during this visit than the last. A few photos during our retreat and our visit was over.
It is worth noting that unlike most of the other nest sites we have been monitoring over the years, this female is really untidy, as she constantly has food on the nest ledge itself. While this is typical as the hatchlings become older and more independent, this is not typical of when the female is incubating or brooding young hatchlings. Keeping any food on the same nest ledge this close to the incubation and or young hatchlings attracts other scavengers and most always we see the resident female take the garbage and uneaten food away. This is one of the reasons that most of the resident females don’t eat on the nest ledge or eat close to the nest itself when there is eggs or young hatchlings.
As with our previous visits at this nest site, Lynn seems to allow both fresh and older un-eaten and old partially eaten carcases and other food scraps scattered around the actual nest ledge very close to the !
Upon entering and exiting the roof, we also noticed three more dead Woodcock carcases, - (two very old and one very fresh uneaten carcases). *See attached photos.
Woodcock seems to be in abundance and a preferred food by the pair at this site, as we have recorded many such Woodcock in the previous years at this nest site.
