Yesterday morning (2/28), Mom Berry brought a Coot to the nest. I thought it was a great video to capture. Mom arrives at the nest with a prey item. Then she turns and you can clearly see that it is a Coot:
Mom makes quick work of removing the feathers and starts feeding the babies. Dad Berry is there and then he leaves and then he comes back. At one point, Mom impresses them all with her Coot head eating skills:
Then Mom flies off the back of the nest (and you can see how her left foot sticks out). All good stuff. Then, as I was editing the video, I realized that the Coot was alive way too long. So, even though we are all used to the bloody feedings, it's unsettling to watch knowing that the Coot suffered through quite a bit of this video. For that reason, I am putting a warning on here to not watch it if you are sensitive. Alternatively, you can watch it from the start until 1:12 and then skip to 8:20. Here's the link. (15:17)
Here's a couple of s'caps from today:
And here's a quick video of the chicks interacting with each other and one of them trying out its wings.
An owl attacked Mom Decorah Bald Eagle last night. What's with these owls? Mom was sleeping with her head tucked when suddenly she jerked awake. Then shortly after, an owl does a touch-and-go off of her back. The owl stayed close, made me jump when it called. Great Horned Owls are a threat to nesting Bald Eagles. Eagles can only see about as well as humans do in the dark. Owls have a big advantage. After the attack, I'm not sure if Mom is adopting a subservient posture or if she is trying to protect the egg while being at the ready. I just wanted her to lay down and keep that egg warm! I guess Dad Decorah wasn't around or he would have joined her in the nest. Here's a link to the video. Pretty wild! Here's some stills, but definitely check out the video... How do you sleep after that?
It's day 3 for the little one at the Berry College Bald Eagle nest. First thing this morning, Mom looks wet and I think that's sleet on her, the way it rolled off of her back.
Here's Dad getting into position to incubate. He steps oh-so-carefully, straddling the egg and chick. Notice that he's got his toes curled in so his talons don't cause any damage:
These are my favorite pictures from today. This is Dad on duty:
This is still Dad, doing a pretty good job of taking care of his young. And look how wide that mouth is open!
I'm not sure what's going on with Mom when she's incubating. She kind of falls forward. I'm not sure if this has something to do with her leg. I'm scared that she is going to sustain another injury by laying improperly. This position has become the norm. If she's not able to incubate properly, this could be the reason the other egg hasn't hatched. She's got to be able to get her brood patch all the way down onto the egg:
Here's why Mom scares me. She can't put hardly any weight on her left foot. While trying to get into position, she had to catch herself with her wing:
Then a moment later she is using her wing as a crutch. She will put her left foot down, then lurch her right foot forward to try to get into position... I'm scared she is going to step on (and injure) that baby. Poor thing. She is trying so hard and doing the best that she can.
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I spent some time yesterday with some of the photographers down at Honey Bee Golf Course. That is Bald Eagle HK's territory. I got some video. Nothing awesome, but I'll process it and get it posted later this week. Right before I got there I missed HK gathering grass for the nest. (He swooped in and grabbed it just like they do when catching fish.) He mated with someone (there were two other eagles there and they weren't sure if it was the banded female.) And then after I left there was an altercation at the nest between HK and a sub-adult. That's everything I missed seeing. I also missed getting video of HK landing at the nest because I was just driving up. I saw it, but I was driving... He made a great approach, it would have been great video! Oh well. On the bright side: Here's a picture that Shelly Fowler took, it is posted here with her permission. This is after HK arrived at his nest and found this sub-adult there. This picture was taken right after HK knocked the youngster out of his nest. Neither one looks too happy. It was going on dark when this picture was taken. Yesterday was the first time I'd been to his nest. Let me tell you, this is an urban Bald Eagle! And that's a huge nest!
With the hatch yesterday at Berry College Bald Eagle nest on day 39, I reviewed the stats on the NBG nest from 2007 to 2012. During these years, the exact dates for egg laying, hatching and fledge dates are known because of the eagle cam on that nest during those years. During that time, 13 eggs hatched. In 2008, Buddy's year, his was the only egg. He hatched on day 36. This would indicate that there was no delay in incubating his egg. The other 12 eggs were from 4 different years, with 3-egg clutches each year:
- The four first-laid eggs had 2 hatch at 38 days and 2 hatch at 39 days. There was a big delay in incubation.
- The four second-laid eggs had 2 hatch in 37 days and 2 hatch in 38 days. There was some delay in incubation.
- The four third-laid eggs all hatched in 36 days -- no delay in incubating the last egg laid.
- Each year, there was at least 6 days between the first and last laid egg. And each year, all chicks had hatched in at least 2 fewer days.
Maybe 36 days should be the standard, not 35 as I've read... I'm going to stop holding my breath on day 35...
Here's a video of the Berry College egg when it is partly cracked.
I also found another video showing a little difference of opinion about who was going to incubate and who was going to go catch some dinner. This video starts w/Dad Berry in the nest and then Mom Berry joins him, almost knocking him over when she lands behind him. (I think they normally land on a branch then drop down into the nest. Maybe she can't do that with her leg. It looks like she just landed in the nest and into Dad.) Dad starts incubating, but Mom's typically want to do all of the incubating right after hatch. So when she returned from taking a break, Dad wouldn't move out of the way so she could resume incubating. There's no audio with this cam, but you can see that she is giving him an earful. At one point she beaks at his tail. Here's a s'cap I took yesterday of her giving him the evil eye:
She can't walk very well because of her injured left leg, so she stands and waits for him to move. He finally leaves and she resumes incubating the egg and hatchling. At the end of the video you can see her using her left wing as a crutch when she's getting situated over the nest bowl. This video is a little over a half-hour. That's how long the stand-off lasted... It's got some good video of the cute little bobble-head! And it's interesting seeing the adult's interactions. He was mostly ignoring her, but at one point, he did look back at her:
Shortly thereafter, Dad left. (I included the counter in this s'cap. See in the bottom bar toward the left-hand corner? When I took this s'cap, there were 13,537 people watching the cam at that moment):
Mom quickly settled in to incubate. I've noticed that she has a brown feather in the middle of the white tail feathers high up. (Do I need to circle it, or do you see what I'm referring to?)
I love this picture: "Hi Momma! What's up?"
I don't know what this is in her mouth. Food of some sort... Looks pretty gross. I was thinking, "Spit it out!" Any ideas what that is?
That's all my s'caps from yesterday (hatch day). I took a few today, day 1. So happy to see a feeding. I'm not sure when the first feeding was. I can't sit in front of the cam 24/7. I wish I could, but I know that there is a lot that I miss. Like yesterday, I didn't know there was a hatch until 5:00PM or so when I got home from Honey Bee... Anyway, I finally saw a feeding today by Dad. Dad's always give the biggest pieces, but the little one handled it just fine:
This is Mom on the nest. This is why she scares me, the way she lurches around on her bad leg. In this s'cap, she is chewing at her left leg (maybe it's healing and it itches...) One of the talons on her right foot is on the baby. The baby was moving around and didn't appear to be injured. But she worries me...
