NestCam 2012

I know I've left it a bit late, but yesterday I cleaned out my nestbox with a camera in it so that we may get some good views of nesting birds again this year.  I had originally intended to clean it at the end of August last year, but as it requires step ladders putting in a neighbour's garden and a climb up on a flat roof, I just didn't get round to doing it before the winter set in.

Anyway, spurred on by the fact that it's already been inspected once by a Blue Tit (which hasn't returned for over a week now), I decided to get up there and quickly give it a spring clean.  Fortunately I didn't need to take the whole box down, as unscrewing the two front sections gave me good access to remove the previous nest and disinfect the box.  As the camera looks vertically down on the nest, it was quite good to see the nest from a different angle and work out where the birds had been in the box.

The nest itself was mainly compacted moss and feathers and had a little indentation in one corner where the eggs had been laid and incubated.  There were no signs of any eggshells or remains of chicks that had died, and so the birds had done a good job at removing all the unwanted debris from inside the box.

The floor of the box was very pitted from all the pecking that had been going on in the days before the birds decided to use it for nesting.  They really had removed quite a lot of wood and my guess is that they were testing it for strength, but it might have been part of their mating display.




After a quick spray of disinfectant and a wipe out with some kitchen roll, I left the box open for a while to dry out and take in the fresh air.  I also tried to adjust the camera position a little to get a more even view, but it was very difficult to see what I was doing with the TV being downstairs in the kitchen!

After refixing the front sections, I gave the outside a wipe and brush down to remove a few cobwebs that had been attached to the roof and eaves for most of the winter, and that was that - all ready for the new tenants.  Last year they started nest-building in March with the eggs being laid in April.  So fingers crossed, we'll get something similar this year.  Keep watching for the live nestcam to appear here on my blog.

YouTube Test Videos

I've been experimenting with putting some of my Blue Tit videos on YouTube. These can be enlarged to full screen by clicking on the control in the bottom right of the control bar.

NestCam Update: STOP PRESS

An Empty Nest Box

That's it - they're gone!  When I got up later than usual at 7am this morning the nest box was empty and there were no signs of Wills, Kate or any of the chicks in my back garden.  They must have left early this morning, because all three were sleeping in the nest when I went to bed at 12pm last night.

I was very happy that three chicks had fledged but quite sad to have missed it both live and on camera - I don't have any video recordings of them actually leaving.  Anything you see from now on will be recorded highlights of the last few days in the nest box and soon I'll be removing that.

Although I would like to see them again, I do hope they don't hang around for long in my back garden because the score is currently 3-0 to our cats - trying to keep them away from birds is nigh on impossible.

Good Luck chicks, I hope to see you again in my nest box next year.

Later that same day ...

After spending a long time looking, I did get a glimpse of Wills and Kate and two of their chicks in a Willow tree in my next-door neighbour's garden.  They were quite hard to spot due to the tree's hanging branches which are now fully leaved, but the parents taking in food gave them away.  At times the fledglings seemed to practice short flights between a Hawthorne in my garden and the Willow tree.  Wills and Kate also returned briefly to the fat balls on my feeding station. but shortly after were gone and I haven't seen them since.

NestCam Update

Well things are really hotting up now.  The three chicks are very active and food is in constant supply by Wills and Kate.  Kate has been encouraging the chicks towards the nest box hole by holding food in her beak and not letting go of it and they've been looking out of the hole a few times today.

The chicks have been doing a lot of preening, wing stretching and fluttering and so I reckon that they are ready to go.  It could be today although it's a bit late now, but it will probably be early tomorrow, so watch this space.

NestCam Update

 Today I rigged up an external camera to view the birds from outside the nest box and that's why there are now two images on the live video stream.  Unfortunately I won't be able to leave it out overnight or in bad weather as I haven't managed to protect the power supply from getting wet safely enough for my liking.  I'll probably put some recordings on the left side when the live camera is not available.

The three chicks seem to be doing pretty well and are now getting on top of the nest material quite frequently.  They are stretching and fluttering their wings quite a lot and I don't think it will be long before they fledge.  Hopefully the external camera might catch them as they leave the nest for the first time.  Currently all three are huddled together and seem to be asleep and I have a feeling they might be gone by tomorrow night.

This morning was quite stressing for Sarah and me as one of our cats (Millie) briefly caught a baby House Sparrow and had it her mouth for a while.  Luckily Sarah saw it happen and was out like a shot to rescue it.  After locking Millie up in the house, I managed to get the sparrow into a box where we had a look it.  At first it seemed OK but then Sarah discovered it had a puncture wound on its back.  It did attempt to fly across the lawn but didn't seem able to take off, so we kept it in the box for a couple of hours with some ripped up newspapers, mealworms and seed. 

We did ponder taking the sparrow to the vet but in the end didn't think they'd have much time for it.  Anyway, after a couple of hours we went back to the box and it had gone - as the cats had been confined to the house duriong this time, we'd like to think it flew off by itself having recovered from its ordeal.

It's going to be really hard ensuring that the cats don't catch our fledgling Blue Tits.

NestCam Update

It's been a pretty depressing week here in the Big Birdie House and I've been avoiding posting until things settled down.  We're down to just three live chicks remaining from the original eight that hatched and I've watched much of it unfold on the NestCam. There was a period when a chick was dying every day and I really thought we were going to lose all of them.  At times when I looked in the nest there were no chicks in view at all and I thought they might have been taken by another bird, even though the entrance hole is quite small.  It seems what is happening in our box is a common theme happening in nest boxes all over - I know of another Blue Tit nest which started with nine live chicks and is now down to just three, with some chicks dieing that were feathered and quite advanced in their development.

The dead chicks have sometimes remained in view for a day or two before vanishing.  For a while I wasn't sure if they were being pushed under the nest by Wills and Kate or if they were being carried outside.  One day I thought I saw Kate carry out what looked like a small leg bone and after talking to someone else it seems that the parents do break the dead chicks up in the nest and remove them in stages if they can't carry them out whole.

Well on the bright side, we've had three chicks for the last few days and they seem to be doing OK, although one does seem a little smaller and weaker than the other two.  There's certainly no brotherly or sisterly love in the nest environment - the strong survive and the weak die.  It even seems that one bird actively prevents the others from being fed by standing on them or putting its wings over them.  And Kate the female bird doesn't seem to be able to share the food out evenly either - one chick in particular gets fed more than the others.

All three chicks now have feathers and their eyes are open so they look like proper little Blue Tits. They spend most of the day hiding under the nest matreial until the parents return with food. They're also making quite a lot of noise at times, with one chick cheeping after another in sequence. The largest bird occasionally pops out and tries to get on top of the nest.

I'll be trying to set up an external camera this week to get ready for the chicks fledging and leaving the nest box which should be sometime soon - if this is successful there'll be another live image available to see.

NestCam Update Update

Just a quick update on what for the most part has been a quite depressing day.  I thought that there were only six live chicks this morning, but actually I was wrong, there must have been seven.  However, during the course of the morning I saw a chick die on the NestCam.  Seeing this made me wonder about this whole NestCam thing and whether I want to witness the struggle for life live on camera like this.

The dead chick was much smaller than the others and struggled to get fed when the parents came with food. At one point one of the other chicks seemed to put a wing over its neck when it was straining to get fed and it never recovered from that.  It lay on the nest floor for a while without moving and although it did move again at some point, I later found it lying motionless and it didn't move again.  I don't know what will happen to the dead chick, whether they'll be able to take it out or if it will just stay at the bottom of the nest.

So then I thought we were down to just five chicks as they have been out of view for most of the day due the overhanging nest I mentioned in the previous post.  For most of the day I only ever saw five mouths at once and so I assumed this must be right.  However, my mood has lifted a little now as I've just managed to count six live chicks and they all seem OK.  One must have been hidden in the nest this morning or perhaps it was too weak to get out into the open.

So that's good news with which to end I suppose, isn't it?

NestCam Update

Yesterday was a worry for us as there were many times in the day when there didn't seem to be much sign of life the nest box.  However, it now seems that the nest material has been undercut at its base and that the chicks are staying tucked under the overhanging edges out of view for most of the day.  The nest is very deep now and even Kate almost disappears when she sits in it.

This morning I've counted only six chicks popping up for food, and so we might have lost another one since Friday.  If it is staying under the overhang, it's not getting fed and there was a very small chick yesterday which always seemed to miss out at feeding time.

I used the internet to investigate what might be happening to the missing chicks and here are some possibilities: the nest might have been raided by a Magpie, Crow or even a Woodpecker, but this seems unlikely as the hole seem too small for them to get in.  Fleas might suck a chick's blood and cause it to die, but Kate is constantly checking the nest and removing unwanted stuff.  Another male bird might have entered and killed a chick to establish it's territory or gain control of the nest.  But what seems most likely is that the last born chicks are much smaller and weaker than the first born and they can't compete for food when the parents present it to them.

There's nothing much we can do about any of this except to let nature take it's course - infant mortality is very high in birds and that's one reason why they lay so many eggs.

Nestam Update

It's been several days since my last post because not much has been happening except for the usual routine of feeding, removing poop (and presumably fleas) and sitting on the nest.  That was, until yesterday.  The sad news is that we can only count seven chicks now when there had been eight alive a couple of days ago. 

The last egg did seem to take a long time to hatch and the chick was obviously a lot smaller than the others - perhaps it couldn't compete for food in the rough and tumble of the nest.  We don't know if it's the last chick than has died or another one, but we're fairly sure it's gone and it looks like it might not even be in the nest any more.

Of the remaining seven, six seem about the same size and pretty active but there is another one which looks a bit smaller and it seems not to get fed as often.  Hopefully it will survive as the parents are doing their best in terms of looking after their brood.

NestCam Update

I didn't have time to post this morning before going to work, but I could only count seven chicks.  However, the last remaining egg wasn't in view either, and so I was hopeful that it might have hatched.  At work I had trouble logging on to my NestCam, so I had to phone up my wife Sarah who was at home to reset the WebCamXP server.  When this was done the picture came back, but I still couldn't see eight chicks.

All eight chicks present and correct !

Anyway, I've just looked now as the chicks are active and currently being fed and I'm pretty certain there are eight mouths popping up when Kate calls them to receive food.  And the egg is nowhere to be seen, so that's really good news.

NestCam Update

There were seven in the bed, and the little one said ...

Well it's Sunday evening now and I can confirm that there are seven live Blue Tit chicks and only 1 egg that's not hatched yet.  It's taken all day for me to see seven mouths all pop up at once, and that's the only way I can be sure they're all OK.

Kate removes a white fecal 'poop' sac

There is a distinctive 'cheeping' sound coming from the chicks now and Kate doesn't half squawk when she wants to them to pop their heads up and be fed.  Wills is bringing food in regularly and Kate still leaves the nest from time to time to do her own thing.

Kate feeding the chicks

We can now recognise the different sounds the birds make when they are warning of some kind of danger such as one of our cats (or me) nearby, and when they have returned with food.  Wills makes a noise from a perch outside the nest box and Kate replies to tell him to come in with the food.  It's great to hear and watch.

Only one egg left now, let's hope it hatches

During the day I took some photos of Wills and Kate outside in my garden and here'e the best of them:

Lovely grub !!!



Wills - a handsome dude isn't he?



Wills in a Rowan tree



Wills with his hackles raised because I was too close.



Is there anybody at home?

Wills passing food to Kate

Kate taking a break



NestCam Update

Easy like Sunday Morning and I can only see one egg left, so I'm presuming that seven chicks have hatched.  I find them impossible to count and be certain unless their mouths are open, even though the picture on my DVD recorder screen is much better than the live images I'm broadcasting over the web.  Someone else has commented that there are seven chicks and so I'll take their word for it.

The chicks have little tufts of hair on their heads which makes them look quite cute, especially with their black sunglassess on! On the other hand they do have a certain gremlin-like quality about them at present.  They're making very faint 'cheeping' noises now too.

I've seen Kate removing white poop sacs, so the food must be going down and coming out of the other end OK. I hope we get eight healthy chicks and that they all survive and fledge, but you never know with this Circle of Life thing, do you?

Here's a link to an interesting article on Blue Tit chicks: The Growing Pains of Blue Tits

NestCam Update

I think we've got another chick this morning, but it's very hard to tell when there's just a mass of pink flesh all huddled together covering the remaining eggs!  It's best to count them when their heads pop up for feeding, but as yet I've only see a couple do this today.  Here's some of this morning's photos:

This is Wills passing some food he has just collected to Kate:

Kate squawks to let the chicks know that there's some food available and their heads pop up with gaping mouths ready to be fed.

If the chicks don't take the food, Kate seems to swallow it and I don't think she regurgitates it for them later.  However, she might be able to keep some in her beak and give it to them in smaller anounts, but it's difficult to tell if this is happening.

NestCam Update: Stop Press

I've not been able to post here for the last couple of days because Blogger has been down, but at about 6:10am this morning our first Blue Tit chick hatched.  Immediately mum (Kate) tried to feed it without much success - the chick didn't seem able to take the caterpillar grubs which did seem quite large.  Dad (Wills) brought a regular supply of grubs and insects for a good ten minutes, but the chick didn't take these either.  I left for work not knowing if it was feeding properly or not.

When I got to work at 9am I had a quick look to see if any more chicks had hatched, but none had.  Then at 10am a work colleague who reads my blog told me there were three chicks and later my wife told me another had hatched by 11.38am.  She also said that during the day they had started to feed better as Wills and Kate brought in a regular supply of food.

Great news and only four more eggs to hatch, which will probably be tomorrow now.  I need to get over the BTO's Nest Box Challenge website now to update our report data there.

NestCam Update

Still no news I'm afraid - here's this morning's picture of the eight Blue Tit eggs in the nest:

Using another nest of which I know, I've recalculated the date of hatching to be Friday or Saturday this week.  Here's this evening's picture:

NestCam Update

Well yesterday (Day 14) came and went with no sign of any eggs hatching and so now we're in to Day 15 and still awaiting our first baby Blue Tit.  Here's this morning's picture from the NestCam:

NestCam Update

I haven't posted for a couple of days because Kate has stopped laying, with a total of eight eggs.  She now spends quite a lot of time on the nest turning the eggs, improving the nest, sleeping or preening.  No new feathers have been brought in for a few days now, so she must have decided the nest is warm enough.

Whilst on the nest Wills is bringing her caterpillar grubs and she does still leave occasionally to look for food herself.  We're just playing the waiting game now, looking forward for the first egg to hatch, which could be today or tomorrow if they stick to a 14 day schedule.

The commenting system on my blog has not been working properly and I hope that's why we haven't had any comments from all the many people who've visited the blog to see the NestCam. I've changed it to pop up in a window now - We'd really appreciate any comments that people would care to make under any post message.  Cheers!

NestCam Update

It looks as if Kate has stopped laying now with eight eggs in the nest - let's hope they all hatch.  Here's this morning's picture of the nest:

NestCam Update

Back to work this morning so I could only have a quick look - I can only see eight eggs today, which is the average number laid and the same as yesterday, unless a new one is hidden from view.  See you later. 

Minor Update

Yep, we seem to have 'maxed out' on the eggs now - eight eggs visible this afternoon which is the same number as yesterday, so it looks as if Kate has stopped laying.  Only four or five days until we expect the first of them to hatch. Here she is turning the eggs:

Please leave any comments you'd like to make about the NestCam or the blog in the comments section at the bottom of this post.