Nightingales in November (30 page)

Growing quickly on a constant stream of fish, the Kingfishers' nesting chamber by now will not just reek of partly decomposed and regurgitated meals but also look a sight, as the discarded sheaths are added to the overall mess. The youngsters, when not cadging fish from their parents, will spend a lot of time preening their newly acquired feathers, and where room permits, may also be stretching and flapping their wings to build up the all-important flight muscles. As
fledging approaches, the nest can often become a much quieter place as the parents slowly reduce the frequency of feeds in order to encourage the chicks out. As the middle of May slips by, the bright orange and blue youngsters will intuitively and suddenly know it's time to leave as they trudge down the tunnel and into the light for the first time.

Due to the delayed arrival of spring further north, Scottish Blue Tits may well only just be beginning incubation, as their southern cousins see their clutches starting to hatch. Immediately upon emergence of each chick the female will step into pick up any discarded eggshell, before then jettisoning it some distance away from the nest. The entire clutch can take anything from a few hours to a whole day to hatch, and as the tiny, blind chicks are susceptible to chilling at this stage they will need to be initially brooded for large parts of the day and all night. The clutch hatching is also the trigger that instantly sees the male pressed into action as he undertakes the first of many foraging trips for his brood. Initially tiny morsels like aphids, small caterpillars and spiders are brought back, but the young will quickly be in a position to start taking caterpillars, the staple diet of any Blue Tit chick. To keep up with the increasing demands of their ravenous youngsters, the number of visits to the nest by the male, and in good weather by his partner, will rise exponentially as the surrounding foliage is scoured for caterpillars. These prey items are then brought back to a sea of hungry gapes at the nest, with any faecal sacs taken away afterwards as the parents waste no time in departing on yet another foraging mission. If the adults have timed their broods correctly, they will be able to take advantage of the sudden huge flush of caterpillars that late spring brings, and with so much natural food on offer in the countryside, garden bird tables will often
become surprisingly quiet when compared to winter and early spring. While sunflower hearts or peanuts will undoubtedly provide sufficient energy to help keep the parents busy from dawn to dusk, they're not considered the ideal foodstuffs for the growing chicks, which given the choice will plump for a protein-rich caterpillar every time.

Late May

Safely entombed in their fortified subterranean chamber, a high proportion of all the Kingfisher chicks that manage to hatch should successfully make it to fledging day. But surely the far sterner examination of the youngsters' ability to defy the odds of reaching parenthood will only begin once they learn how to catch fish. Like many bird species, the young all tend to fledge in one day, often with gaps of 10 to 20 minutes between each youngster's leap of faith. For those that don't manage to fly immediately to safety from the entrance hole, and tumble down into the water, there is a very real possibility that unless they can flap to the bank side they will quickly drown. Once the young do manage to make it to a riverside perch, they won't return the nest chamber again, but will instead have their valiant efforts rewarded as their parents either bring them a meal to their new perch, or whisk them off for their first fishing expedition.

If the young naive Kingfishers are to have any chance of pulling though then they must hone their fishing skills as quickly as possible, with many fledglings pressed into diving on the very day they fledge. Their parents' practised technique makes a physically demanding and technically accomplished skill look effortless, and so as the youngsters attempt to emulate the ‘professionals' there will inevitably be a fair number of mishaps along the way. Some juveniles, having dived in, may simply become waterlogged and
drown, while others will struggle, yet somehow live to dive another day. Of course during this period of intense tuition, the juveniles will also be fed by their parents who are able to quickly locate their young charges amongst the bank-side foliage by their ‘
chip, chip
' begging call. This ‘safety net' will not last long though, particularly as the parents will be keen to raise at least one more brood and so from around day four the adults' response to begging will change from that of feeding to rebuking. This ‘tough love', however, is merely a precursor to even rougher treatment, as the parents shortly afterwords harden their attitude even further to mercilessly chasing them out of their territory. Evicted irrespective of the state of their fishing skills, the youngsters will need a fair bit of luck and to learn quickly if they're to survive through to next spring without either starving, drowning or being predated.

Unlike young Kingfishers, juvenile Lapwing are able to feed independently almost immediately upon hatching, although the Lapwings' main issue is not a lack of food but avoiding the high levels of predation seen on many wader breeding grounds. For those Lapwing chicks that hatched in late April, while still not quite able to fly, a much enhanced mobility should already have exponentially increased their chances of successfully fledging next month. The last feathers to emerge will be those from the tail, and the paler tips to the greenish-bronze feathers across their back and wings will give the youngsters a distinctly ‘scalloped' appearance as they continue to feed under the watchful eye of their attentive parents.

Some three weeks after leaving the nest, all the young Robins should by now have fully graduated from fledging academy, but with their trademark red breast not due to make an
appearance until later in the summer, they will still look utterly different from their parents for a while yet. This decidedly speckled and camouflaged plumage will not just help them avoid detection by Sparrowhawks, Stoats and cats, but also give them a free pass under the radar of any territorial adult Robins. Now temporarily released from the responsibility of caring for his brood, the male Robin will be free to return to his mate, who should be incubating her second clutch, which if all goes according to plan, will hatch in early June.

Having already emerged from their tree-hole cavity around three weeks ago, those Tawny Owl youngsters managing to successfully navigate the difficult first couple of weeks should by now be flying much more strongly, leaving them free to investigate their parents' territory. The boundaries marking the full extent of their parents' universe will be learnt quickly as the youngsters immediately shy away from any neighbouring adults or sounds of any broods in adjacent territories. While making their first exploratory steps, the young will still have made little, if any, attempt to catch their own food, remaining utterly reliant on their parents for all their meals. Even with the prolonged level of support given by mum and dad, it's thought that their care is restricted purely to the provision of food and defence against predators, and there seems little evidence that the adults actually train the young how to hunt on their own. This is a skill, however, that the young will not be able to put off practising for much longer as once they disperse into the surrounding countryside later in the summer they will very much be on their own.

For those young Peregrines hoping to fledge in early June, late May should see the nest site as a hive of activity. As the
juveniles' wing and tail feathers develop strongly, the contour feathers will also begin appearing in lines and patches around the back and breast, leading to the preening of all these newly emerged plumes turning into a major occupation. The youngsters will also be ruffling their feathers on a regular basis, to help shake out any loose down and ensure the feathers are properly aligned to ensure maximum insulation during any cold and wet spells. The young will also be rapidly increasing their exercise regime by walking around and wing-flapping as they work on strengthening their flight muscles. This increased mobility will in turn enable them to defecate over the edge of the tower block or cliff face, so helping to make sure their freshly emerged feathers don't become prematurely soiled. As the food continues to be brought in, by around their 31st day the chicks should be capable of ripping up any plucked and headless prey by themselves, and by the time fledging arrives, at around 40 days, they should be competent in demolishing an entire fresh carcass. As the young will soon discover though, actually catching their own prey will be a different ball-game altogether.