The Live Owl Cam feed will be switched off on the 2nd December to allow the feed to be updated over the winter. We will resume normal service sometime in the early spring.

 

 

The screenshot from earlier this afternoon shows a very contented female owlet surrounded by six field mice.

In the vicinity of the owl tower we have had eight and a quarter inches of rain in the past six weeks! he ground is so saturated it has driven the field mice out of the comfort of their homes and made them easy targets for the adult owls. So we have a surfeit of prey and this is why our remaining chick hasn’t flown the nest yet.

Soon the parent birds will entice her out of the tower so she can learn to hunt prior to her journey into the big wild world.

We shall soon be turning the camera off after what has been a real roller coaster ride of a season with many sad events but with some happy times too. We do hope our viewers have appreciated this intimate view into the lives of barn owls which will doubtlessly have been replicated in other nests all over the country.

As we predicted in earlier blogs, viewers will have noticed that our chicks are not always in the nest box. The tower is designed with a large entrance porch on the front which leads into a tunnel. The tunnel then lead to the box.

The smaller chick is often in the box and last night was so well fed it actually ignored a half grown rat brought in by the adults. The older chick sits in the front entrance and gets the early offerings.

Sometimes we can hear this chick hissing in the early evening even though we can’t see it. Soon they will both spend their time in the front entrance porch.

Earlier today our licensed ringers visited the owl tower and ringed the chicks.

The owlets are now more than seven weeks old and on closer examination were found to be brother and sister. They weighed about 330 grams each and looked very healthy.

Hopefully they will fledge in two or three weeks time.

 

It was encouraging to see both owlets getting their fair share of the prey brought in last night. We don’t see the adults anymore as the chicks wait immediately below the entrance hole to the nest chamber and the prey is passed down to them.

The first feed was at 7.44 pm and there were three more by 10 pm.

Our viewers often comment that they have not seen the adults for several days. Some even wonder if they are still around. Of course the chicks would starve very quickly if this were the case.

It was good to see the youngsters looking so healthy last night. Second broods of barn owls are notorious for producing large clutches of eggs which often end up as a tiny brood of youngsters at the fledgling stage.

Ours began as eight eggs and have now been reduced to two chicks. They won’t be in view of the camera in a week or two so enjoy them while you can.

Today one of our chicks died. The screenshot shows the lifeless owlet with one of its siblings. The other one will be in the tunnel awaiting the parent birds returning with food.

Yet another very sad harsh reminder of the truism, “The survival of the fittest” ….

The camera feed problem has now been resolved and we are back online. It is inevitable, given the the distance of the camera from the exchange and the condition of the telephone wiring together with the complexity of the installation that the feed will go offline occasionally.

The feed will only be discontinued when the nest box has been vacated. Do please remember that this free service is provided by the Trust as part of its charitable objectives and we do not monitor the feed 24/7.