Having not seen the Blackbird chicks since they fledged a couple of weeks ago, it was reassuring to see three on the shed roof earlier this week. Now, as you will recall, we had two sets of Blackbird families hatched in the garden. Each nested yielded at least three chicks. We called the nest by the back door, family 'Set-A' and the nest high up in the conifers, family 'Set-B'. Well 'Set-A' hatched three of the four eggs. family 'Set-B' hatched three eggs of an unknown original quantity of eggs.
The three fledglings from family 'Set-A' soon dispersed from the garden, we believe to adjoining gardens, but the adult male Blackbird still was observed (and still is around, as he frequently has aerial fights with the male from 'Set-B') in the garden digging for worms and accepting mealworms. The adult female Blackbird has gone and has not been seen since the chicks fledged. She built a second nest in our garden but never occupied it. We can only assume that she has taken-up with another male or has perished!
Meanwhile, both the male and female adults from 'Set-B' are constantly making noisy demands of us to be fed mealworms!!! It's the male that does all the feeding of the fledglings. The female appears to completely ignore the fledglings if they are anywhere near her! She will not feed them at all! Though she will take food for herself. Now, she maybe on another nest, we don't know, but the male still defers to her if she's around and wants first dibs at the mealworms! So it was good to see three fledglings this morning, on the shed roof...being fed by two males! Whose belong to who? A fledgling even came to the back door with the male from 'Set-B' (both males can clearly be separately identified) to be fed and this is when I snapped thee photos!
No comments:
Post a Comment