Len Pick Trust Owl Project

The camera is working again.

At lunchtime there were four chicks and one egg.

Whether this last egg will hatch we don’t know but it’s already a day overdue.

Now the success of the brood will depend on the male’s ability to catch enough prey to feed himself, the chicks and the female, as she won’t leave the chicks to help with the hunting for another two weeks.

There is over a week’s difference in age between the youngest and eldest chick. Barn owls use this hatching strategy so they can rear at least some of the brood if the weather turns bad during the nights to come.

When the fourth chick was due to hatch last Thursday, the camera stopped relaying pictures.

By now all five eggs should have hatched but there is no way of knowing for sure.

If the picture doesn’t return we won’t be able to do anything until they are ringed by our licensed ringers in June.

We will publish an updated blog then.

At 9.22am today the third chick appeared.

The male is being a good father and bringing in lots of prey for the female to feed the chicks and herself.

Two young rats can be seen at the back of the nest.

The fourth egg is due to hatch on Thursday afternoon.

Soon after midnight our female barn owl lifted off her eggs to reveal a second chick.

This was only 48 hours after the first. Barn owls usually hatch at 56 hour intervals, but it’s not an exact science.

The third egg is due to hatch on Tuesday lunchtime.

At half past midnight the first barn owl chick of this year’s clutch of five eggs hatched out.

Mother and baby are doing well!

The eggs should hatch at approximately two and a half day intervals so we can expect the next baby owl on Sunday lunchtime.

At noon today the barn owls laid their fifth egg.

Large clutches are not unknown.

If we are to have a sixth egg it should be laid around midnight on Saturday.

Last night, just before 11pm, the fourth egg was laid.

Will there be a fifth this year?

If so it is due on Thursday morning.

At 0926 today our female laid her third egg.

If there is to be a fourth it should arrive sometime on Monday night.

It would now seem the first egg was laid last Monday morning.

The camera has been off line for several days and when it returned we could see the owls have been busy laying two eggs.

It is impossible to know when they were laid but they were seen at 11pm last night.

Hopefully we will have a third egg which will give a rough indication of the laying times of the first two.

The camera at The Len Pick Trust tower has seen many successful breeding seasons in the past and this year our pair are already together and have been seen mating.

It will be a few weeks before we have the first egg as barn owls don’t usually lay in the UK until late April or even early May.

Much depends on the availability of prey. The female needs to get into egg laying condition over the next month or so, and this means eating at least four small rodents each night. Many of these will be brought to her by the male to show her how good a provider he is.

It is possible the vole population might be quite low at the moment as so much of their grassland habitat has been under water recently.

We must wait and see. Fingers crossed.