It is 7:00 in the morning of Oct 11 in Australia, and the tiny chick is now two days old. The baby is thriving, eating his fill while propped up on his little "elbows." Today Swift brought a good-sized bird, whose feathers litter the entire side of the nest box. She fed the chick in the following manner: five bites for me, one tidbit for junior, five bites for me, etc.... Nevertheless, the chick is now full and has fallen over in food coma. Eggshell pieces still remain in the nest, although Swift has nibbled on them. And, of course, one perfect egg remains, hopefully to hatch any moment.

I videoed the feeding and as usual I put the wrong date on it. Sorry Australia. It's still Oct. 10th in Georgia.

The feeding lasted about 15 min. so I cut a lot of it out of the vid. I love when the chick falls over losing it's balance. LOL!
The prey was a beautiful bird with lots of bright colors. Any ideas what it was?

I've noticed that Swift has not been sitting on her other egg very much for the last few days. I don't know if I'm just catching her while she has pushed it out from under her for a few minutes or if this is happening most of the time now. I wonder when the window will close for the 2nd egg to be nonviable?

The new chick was wiggling around and awake when I last looked in. It was the middle of the night there and Mom just had that look like "I wish this baby would go back to sleep." LOL! It's a spunky little squirt in spite of being stomped on a lot by it's clumsy parents.

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The cam is still down. I hope they can get it back online in the next few days or we won't be able to recognize the half grown chick we'll see.

Here's some videos posted by Scott Banks.

The cam is finally back up and running again and the little one has grown like a weed while we weren't looking! I watched Dad bring in breakfast right at daylight and Mom immediately got up and fed the baby. It ate like a pig and had a huge crop before it went into a food coma. LOL!

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New videos are rolling in. Seems like all of us were waiting for this cam to come back up.

Published by skygirlblue

Feeding


Published by scyllabub

S/he is and getting closer and closer to the door. Swift keeps sending Aspro back to the corner and we watched her smothering mother act for awhile yesterday. Today, she is sitting in the doorway enjoying a bit of sun and the view, while Aspro watches intently. You can see cars go by below the tower every once in awhile and Swift continues to bob her head as she watches the goings on outside the nest box. Aspro is getting better at walking around upright on feet rather than legs. It is really good to see this little one thrive.

Too Cute!

Nobody loves falcons better than Mary Anne Reid. Here is a video she shared taken October 31. Swift and Aspro:

"Ma, my feet are big like yours. How come my feathers aren't like yours? Mine are short and stubby and itchy."

"Patience, child, one day your feathers will be long like mine."

"But, Ma, you said that yesterday."

"Patience, child."

Aspro: "One day I will fly. Ma promised."

Aspro was pretty hungry when Beau brought a fairly large bird and passed it to Swift. Aspro grabbed it and took off. The prey passed talons a couple of times and ended up in a tug-of-war. Aspro won, then relinquished the bird to Swift for more plucking and feeding of some choice pieces. Finally, Aspro slipped the remains from Mom's talons and headed for the corner with it, leaving Swift standing in the feathers.

Aspro is not in the box. Swift was sitting in the doorway asleep and has now moved to the corner. Where and when did Aspro go and why is Swift not with her/him?

HisWhisper left this update on Aspro in our SS this morning from http://falconcamproject.org/

It seems from watching the footage that Aspro fell asleep on the ledge and simply fell out. She then appeared to try and scrabble back in, but lost her footage. It’s Sunday afternoon here, and this happened as Scott pointed out just after 5pm yesterday before a night of rain. I will go and have another look around and get back to you asap but I have off-campus work commitments Monday and Tuesday, so be patient.

Aspro 's fall from the tower