To Hatch or Not to Hatch in Waterloo
May 07, 2013 - Kitchener - CTV-Bell Media Tower
Tracy Simpson Reports:
I was in the Waterloo area delivering Project School Visit to elementary school children and knowing that this was around the expected hatch date, if there was to be one, I decided to take my lunch hour down by the CTV tower and monitor the activity in the drum. As I watched, Statler stayed very close by and didn’t wander much beyond the tower itself. She stayed mainly on the top of the drum and slept and moved only once to the railings above and once to the top of the tower where she continued to roost and preen. Caster was clearly inside the drum and was now in an elevated position with his back and head now visible. During the hour that I spent there he shifted, shuffled and wiggled about which had me believing that a hatch had either occurred or was imminent. The all too familiar “razorback” position of the feathers down his spine was also visible and so putting all of these factors together, I considered that this pair had succeeded in doing the “next to impossible” in their chosen environment; eggs were hatching. Statler eventually flew off of the top of the tower and entered the drum to relieve Caster of his duties. She took up the same position as he did which was elevated above the base and with that telltale razorback spine. Before I could share the definitive fact of this news I needed to confirm this with observations of chicks, spent shells or a feeding and so I planned to come back to the site and do just that. The potential for a failed nest still existed as I was only going on my gut feeling and my 14 years of experience doing this. Even with all of my experience and knowing what I was seeing, I still needed complete confirmation as in this particular case I was not going to report a “maybe”. This was a unique situation and confirmation of a hatch would mobilize an entire community (no pressure). I then decided to attend the site again in 5 days or so, when chicks if they were to be had would be able to sit upright for periods of time that would give me the look I needed. More waiting… …phew!
Fatal error: Call to undefined function post_gallery_get_images() in /var/www/html/w/wp-content/themes/cpf200903/index.php on line 29