Ringing PDN

It's been a week since PDN was ringed.

Here is Tim lowering himself down the tower.

(Thanks to Ann Ross for this video)

Here is some footage from the video camera of Tim picking up PDN....

and then PDN returning, none the worse for his encounter.

The unhatched egg was also removed.

Watch this space for the announcement about PDN's (unofficial) name!

Here is a cryptic clue....

(and it's not Edward.)

It's a boy!!

It's official - PDN is a male!

His name has yet to be chosen, but there are a couple of front runners. If you have any appropriate suggestions (and reasons if possible) please use the comment box below.

17 days old - time to be ringed

Today was a very important day!

The chick has been ringed, and now has an identity of its own.

This is the only way that its progress can be followed once it leaves the nest, and allows the peregrine population as a whole to be monitored.

The process was carried out by members of the Gloucester Raptor Monitor Group.

The first stage was for Tim to abseil down the outside of the tower. (Rather him than me!)

When he reached the nesting tray, Tim gently picked up the chick, and with it safely stowed inside a tightly bound rucksack, it was lowered to the roof below.

 Rob (the licensed ringer) was at hand to get it out of the bag.

 Next, he fitted a metal ring on its right leg...

 and a plastic one on the left leg.

This ring has larger and more visible writing allowing it to be read from a distance. After this, some measurements were taken and it was weighed.

Meet "PDN"!

We don't yet know whether PDN is male or female. This can be determined from the measurements and weight data and Rob will let us know in due course.

Once we do know, then PDN will of course need a real name. I do have a couple of ideas however, please feel free to make your suggestions in the comments link below!

Two weeks old

The chick is now two weeks old and as you can see has grown very quickly indeed. It is clearly getting plenty of food from its parents.

It is also much more mobile and can waddle around the tray quite happily. Here is is looking for some shade behind Bella.

Bella still does the majority of the brooding, and here is seen getting the chick to move closer, although the chick doesn't seem to think it needed to! This is the view from camera 3 - there is no sound.

Nine days old

At 9 days old, the chick is becoming more and more demanding!

As soon as food arrives, it begs to be fed. It has even tried pecking at the food itself.

The weather has been rather hot and Bella has (at times) been a really good parent and shields the chick from the sun.

At other times, she leaves it completely alone, and it just lies there in the full sun and pants to try to keep cool.

A week old

The chick is now a week old and seems to be doing really well. It is too late for the last egg to hatch. (It is hidden behind the chick in this video)

Bella is doing virtually all the feeding and incubation using food caught by CR. Sometimes he briefly appears to deliver food to the tray, and at other times, Bella seems to collect it from the "larder" higher up the tower.

Bella is quite houseproud, and flies off with any prey remains after feeding the chick. She also removes some of the sticks that have fallen from the pigeon nest immediately above.

Growing fast

The surviving chick is now 5 days old and is feeding well and as a result is growing fast.

The parents are clearly finding plenty of food, and they are even storing surplus in a "larder" on the top of the tower.

Sadly the last egg is overdue, and is now unlikely to hatch.

One out of three?

The third and final chick should have arrived by now. Sadly it hasn't hatched, so it is rather unlikely that it ever will.

The surviving chick seems to be doing OK, and is certainly taking food and growing rapidly.

The WiFi is now working again. Here are the setup instructions :-

With an internet connection (eg at home), go to the Google Play store (Android) or the App Store (iPad). Search for and install the application called KViewPro.

Now standing in the churchyard between the Abbey and the Gander Lane car park, connect to the WiFi network called “Falcons”. The password is “peregrine”.

Now run the KViewPro application, choose "config" (or "device") and create a new device as follows :-

Device Name = tower

Login Type = IP/DOMAIN

IP Address = 192.168.2.2

Media Port = 9000

User Name = guest

Password = peregrine

Second chick arrives

As luck would have it, CR was also incubating when the second chick hatched at 9.45am on Friday 15th June. This time, he made some very strange quacking type noises, and shortly after a piece of eggshell was seen beside him indicating the arrival of chick #2.

Bella turned up some 4 hours later with some prey and immediately started to feed the new arrival who tried to take it, although mostly without any success at this stage. This will take a bit more practice.

In case you were wondering why there are so many sticks appearing on the tray, there is, believe it or not, a pigeon nest a couple of feet above them!

RIP chick #1

Here is the moment about 2 minutes after the first chick hatched when CR (who happened to be on incubation duty at the time) handed over to Bella.

She must have heard it squeaking as she seems very interested in what CR was sitting on. She even gives it a gentle nudge before brooding it.

Sadly, this chick died the following day, possibly from starvation as for some reason, it didn't look like it was ever given anything to eat.

Let's hope that chicks #2 and #3 are OK. They are due to hatch any time now.

Sad news

Sadly, the first chick to hatch has died. It looks like it wasn't getting any food and succumbed to starvation. Apparently this is sometimes the case with first-time parents.

The other two eggs are due to hatch imminently, so let's hope that these two are OK.

Hatching?

It looks like at least one egg has hatched. Look at the left side of the picture next to Bella's head.

This picture was taken using an iPad connected to the WiFi link during a brief visit tonight.

I will check the video recorder in the tower tomorrow evening to see what else the video camera has captured.

Midnight changover

Usually Bella does the night time incubating stints, so it was unusual to see CR handing over to her just after midnight.

It took him a while to fly off into the darkness.

An experiment.

As the level of activity is about to rapidly increase with the imminent hatching of the 3 eggs, I thought it would be a good idea if the live video from the camera was made available.

There is no internet connection in the tower, but I have rigged up a WiFi link which seems to work outside on the Abbey Lawns, but I have not been able to test it with more than one device at a time.

With an internet connection (eg at home), go to the Google Play store (Android) or the App Store (iPad). Search for and install the application called KViewPro.

Now standing in the churchyard between the Abbey and the Gander Lane car park (eg by the copper beech tree), connect to the WiFi network called “Falcons”. The Password is “peregrine”.

Now run the KViewPro application, choose "config" (or "device") and create a new device as follows :-

Device Name = tower

Login Type = IP/DOMAIN

IP Address = 192.168.2.2

Media Port = 9000

User Name = guest

Password = peregrine

As the title of this entry suggests, it's only an experiment, so fingers crossed it actually works, but if it doesn't work reliably (or at all), I might have to think again.... 

The range of a WiFi signal is fairly short, but it seems to work OK on the Abbey Lawns. Also note that the gates are locked each evening.

A waiting game

There's not much to see on the cameras at the moment, just one or other of the birds sitting on the eggs and occasionally turning them.

Bella continues to do the lion's share of the incubating, but CR is quite keen to do what he can. Sometimes he makes her wait a while before handing over at the end of his stint.

I am looking at the possibility of getting a live camera feed down to anybody in the churchyard with a mobile phone, ipad or laptop. If this works, then I will publish the access details here.

Royal Wedding

While the Abbey bells were ringing for the Royal Wedding, Bella was doing her best to keep the eggs cool.

Handing over

Although Bella is doing much of the incubation of the three eggs, she does need to leave the nest to feed.

CR therefore takes over for a while.

And then there were three!

Generally the only time that the eggs are visible to the camera is when CR and Bella swap incubation duties.

Early this morning, this gave the first view of a third egg, which from reviewing the videos, seemed to have arrived sometime the previous evening.

Eggs!!!!!!

After all the waiting, Bella has now laid two eggs!

Here is the moment the first one arrived.

Here is Bella returning to the eggs. Careful with your feet....!

CR bringing food

It's all happening a bit late, but CR has been proving to Bella that he can bring in prey when needed.

"Here's a starling, darling!"

Probably too late again

Both birds are around the Abbey tower, and do occasionally visit the nesting tray.

Here is CR bringing Bella some half eaten prey remains.

They are leaving it a bit late in the season, again....

All noise and no action

Lots of noise in this video clip, but ....

....we ought to have seen lots of breeding activity by now. Unfortunately visits to the nesting tray like this have been few and far between, and it is almost certainly too late now (again).

CR scraping

A brief visit to the nesting tray, and CR exhibiting some scraping behavior.

That's more like it!

More promising news at last...

Both Bella and CR paid a visit to the nesting tray the other day.

Plenty of interaction and noise as well!

A snapshot from camera 3 and you can clearly see this is CR.

CR (aka Christopher Robin) has been seen around Tewkesbury Abbey since the winter of 2010-11 and was one of 4 chicks hatched at a site in Cheltenham in 2010. In total, his parents have successfully reared 29 offspring, making them probably the most prolific breeding pair in the country.

Bella is unringed, and arrived on the scene in 2015.

They have not managed to breed, yet.......

Will they breed this year - maybe not...

By now, we should have plenty of activity from our peregrines, but...

...unfortunately, they are all too elusive.

The camera on the nesting tray has seen nothing but a few pigeons (and a pied wagtail), but sadly no peregrines. I did see one bird (I think the female) eating its prey on the tower a few days ago, and there are a few feathers blowing around the churchyard, but it looks like there will not be any breeding this year.

Let's hope I'm wrong.