Day 20 for the two eldest chicks (Day 18 for the younger) and with wings beginning to form and stretch there’s little spare room in the old roost for our former furry blobs. At nearly dad’s height already (approx 300mm, or 12 inches) the available space to make one’s mark is limited but all three blobs appear to be very fit and healthy, no doubt helped by a pair of excellent hunting parents and a bountiful Spring dinner menu.

A roost entry was made this morning to clean the viewing and camera windows again but this time our avian teenagers kicked up a little fuss during the very careful intrusion, and before confirming the parents weren’t actually in there as well the calls were identified as young but maturing falcons. But as soon as dad arrived with a late breakfast the cries reverted back to pleading, hungry and helpless chicks again!

Latest videos can be viewed here … and here …; sorry about the quality but the art of peregrine roost window-cleaning is yet to be perfected without complaints from the tenants!… (with apologies to all sardines out there too!)

After a couple of days without vision a climb was made this evening to wait for mum to finish feeding the 3 blobs and then to depart for a few minutes before an attempt was made to head in to the roost to clean the well-poo’d windows! The camera was permanently on infrared lighting because the window was so dark with ‘stuff’ but all was cleaned safely and exited without any incident, with camera rebooted again. Having just received a very big feed all three chicks were happy to just sit and watch, and allowed us to obtain further great close-up footage which can be viewed here …

Full as ticks after a big dinner

Rough size estimates now show them to be squatting at approx 200mm (8 inches) tall at 16 and 14 days old respectively. Which means there’s very little spare room left for either parent to take shelter, and the food supply has to be constant. After 20 minutes of being fed fairly fairly evenly they took a 5 minute break before coming back to finish off what was left for another 10 minutes, after mum had finished her fill. It appeared to be a pigeon this time. There will be relief when the new and much larger roost is finally swapped in to place after this current  family fly off in mid-November.

The first of the new cameras has arrived and will be tested this week before mounting and attaching to the video bank soon. We anticipate far better reliability and improved colour recordings. Talks are continuing with University IT staff to ascertain what coverage options we will be able to provide across the Internet soon.

Finally a lucky break with peregrine mum heading away for a lengthy period mid-afternoon and a chance to get in to the roost and clean both windows. The not-so-little chicks were intrigued with the monster dressed in white mask and blue gloves but soon forgot when dad arrived with a late lunch. They’re all eating furiously and now stand approx 17-18cm (7 inches). Pretty good photos were snapped using a handheld digital SLR along with great lengthy video with sound, and the resulting two videos can be viewed here (audio) and here ….

Waiting for lunch

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Note: for anyone wanting to view the collection of videos that we’ve made available online over the course of this 2.5 year project (so far) you can go to http://www.youtube.com and search on “peregrine falcon Orange”; this will provide all our videos (and some bogus ones that have somehow made the same list!).

Day 8 for the 2 older chicks (Day 6 for the younger) and the furry blobs are eating well, resting up and growing very quickly. Mum is doing her best to keep the food supply moving while providing good protection and warmth, even on these slightly warmer days. We can tell they’re eating well because both viewing windows are now well covered in poo and so current pictures and video are rather low quality. An attempt was made this evening up the tower for a long period of time to catch mum away on one of her brief flights to be able to enter the roost and quickly clean the windows but she stayed put so we will wait for another moment soon. One of the best features of our new roost, ready to be installed given the best moment, has been to move the viewing windows much further away from the “poo line” and in doing so also provides a wider angle view.

The weekend saw the project hit the newspapers and you can see a copy of the Central Western Daily article here …

We were visited today by Mr Robert Bicknell from our friends at 30th Squadron to see for himself what all the fuss is about and to take some photos away with him.  Fortunately we’d been up the tower to kick start the camera just beforehand and the gods were smiling because the camera stayed up all afternoon giving us some superb vision of the feathered family. During Robert’s visit we also received news crews from (click on links..) Prime TV and WIN TV again to interview us for the news tonight and to see our three new arrivals. We were also visited by the Central Western Daily newspaper team so our chicks are now real local celebrities! Thank you to all news and newspaper crews for their help in publicising our project again; the world needs a “feel-good” report occasionally!

Feeding footage from today can be found here … (5mins – long clip!)

With little coverage from the faulty nest camera today a trip up the swaying tower in the wild, wet and windy weather was made this afternoon and caught mum during feeding time (see video here). Two of the hatchlings were keen to get their fill whereas the third was more interested in staying warm, and mum had her work cut out for her in today’s wild conditions which included the occasional hail drop. A great day to have such a sheltered nest and mum is taking close care of her charges. We will attempt to obtain handheld video with audio in the next day or so.

Our first sighting this morning showed a large piece of broken shell behind mum and the question was asked if this was detritus from the previous two hatchlings or something else. Around lunchtime, after yet another tower climb to plead with the nest camera to keep going a bit longer, mum stood up and presented us with three little furry heads, number three a lot smaller than the two older siblings. Number three spent most of its time this afternoon on its back when mum got up to re-adjust but all three siblings remained very close together.

In between bursts of camera life we presume dad has returned with food offerings at some stage today but he hasn’t been spotted or heard outside at all.

Today’s furry videos can be found here and here …

And then there were three - careful mum!

On a very windy day in Orange the two furry blobs are learning fast and peregrine mum is being ever attentive and protective. The last egg remains and as time goes on the chances of a hatching diminish but there will already be a premium on space in the current roost. Now the first solid feeds have been digested the results are beginning to appear on the walls!

A breather while mum takes a break

The ailing nest camera has provided us with more “up-time” today so the results have improved. Day two videos can be found here and here …

Plenty of time to be active in the next few weeks but for now it’s good being in the warmth under mum’s wings.

Finally, after a 2.5 hour vigil up the tower, we have confirmation of the first two chicks hatched in our 2nd recording season. Initially the top of a broken egg could be seen but mum was sitting tight and just re-adjusted and fidgeted for a long period but finally dad arrived with food and mum got up to take the offering and begin to share it around. The first pics of two furry white heads appeared!

First video can be played by clicking here …

Dad arrives with food

First two chicks appear

Another check this morning showed no signs of life in the nest yet. In between live video camera “hangs” we managed to catch a little vision and she’s still sitting there, shuffling and re-arranging but with no promising signs yet. It’s a very cold day up the tower; not for the faint-hearted.

New videos will be posted later on today so check back for links on this same news post in the next 5-6 hours.

A climb up the tower this morning by two of us to restart the troublesome nest camera showed no change on the nest, with dad doing his awkward stint for about 10 minutes before mum returned after a feed and resumed her position, complete with 3 clean eggs. It’s now Day 34 which is still in the nominal hatching range. Last season we reached approximately Day 40 so there’s still time. All we can do is wait, and in the meantime we’re actively sourcing a replacement temporary camera to get us through the next few weeks before we can secure a full camera and recording system.

Another trip in to the tower over the weekend to check on the peregrines and yet another climb was necessary as the nest camera is not hanging in there. Fortunately no sign of extra heads yet and mum was calm and settled, apart from one episode of frantic and furious gravel scraping and eating, most likely through boredom!

Talks are happening to discuss whether to purchase a temporary (pre-”new system”) camera to be fitted to the remaining view-hole to try and improve our vision as the nest camera appears to have reached its end-of-life, but it has of course provided us with 2.5 years of a superb & totally unique close-up look in to the lives of our peregrine family.

Even though peregrine mum and dad are getting quite sick of their dedicated egg-sitting vigil today is roughly the first possible hatching day. So far no signs of new life but all three eggs are still being incubated with no rejects.

Time for a snooze

Flies have arrived with the warmer weather and make sitting stationary for too long an annoying job!

Unsuccessful attempt at catching a passing fly

The nest camera is misbehaving quite badly at the moment and we’ve had to close off viewing access to other staff to try and solve the problem of constantly dropping connections. Not a good time to lose the link so there will be plenty more tower climbs in the next few days & weeks.

New videos can be found here (Dad trying to sit) and here (Mum taking a break) …