Monday 2nd April 2012

Incubation has begun, although she has not yet finished laying her full clutch (we are assuming that she will lay a fourth egg). It is usual for Peregrines to begin sitting after laying the penultimate egg. Even the male knows that they should now be incubating, as he took a turn today! Note that he is much smaller than the female.

April 1st - Third Egg Video

A short 2 minute video, with the female leaving at the end.

eggs in the sunshine

The female often leaves her eggs whilst she has a fly round the spire. They are safe from predators as one of the pair will be keeping watch. Woe betide any crow or buzzard that even tries to fly past the church in all innocence!
The peregrines will start incubating seriously when the clutch is nearly complete. This is the way they get the chicks to hatch out within a day or two of each other.

Third egg

It was great to see the third egg at lunchtime today.

Saturday 31st March 2012

Relieved to see the falcon back this morning. She left the eggs for a very long time overnight. We can only hope that as she is experienced, she knows what she's doing. She will ensure that the eggs don't chill completely, or get too hot, until she starts incubating properly which may begin immediately after the third egg is laid. The pictures below show that at night, under infra-red, (which the camera automatically changes to in darkness) the eggs appear white.

Second egg

It was a nice sight this morning to be greeted by a second egg!

29th March 2012

It is normal for the female to leave the egg(s) at this early stage. She may be away for a couple of hours. She will cover the clutch during rain showers (or if it gets too hot!). Should a crow be foolish enough to get too close there will be a swift return to safeguard her eggs.

Eggs are laid at 2 to 3 day intervals. In fact it can be as accurate as every 57 hours.