Beau and Jules have been stressed at this site this year, despite the best efforts by the building tenants to disturb them as little as possible. Last time Jules tried to nest here, she only made it half way through incubation before she realized her eggs were too damaged to be viable. So she's never been here this long or rather been so protective/defensive for this long. Last year's site wasn't disturbance free (no site is) but it was better than this. I'm hoping that that will help to deter her from this site ever again. Last year we managed to keep her off, this year with the loss of the 2010 site, I think she just wasn't going to take any chances with a "new" site and it didn't matter what we did. Next year we have new plans to keep her from this particular location.
I think Beau really (really) hates this site now. He spends almost no time with the chick these days, its all Jules. During incubation he used to come in at night and stay awake all night on the egg and when the chick was a couple of days old. Almost never saw him during the day. Haven't seen him at the nest in 4-5 days, but have watched him hand-over food mid-air and do some straffing runs at the building but until last hour, I hadn't seen him on the cameras, day or night for days. He stayed for about 20 minutes then he left. Jules came in a few minutes later and was parked on the chick for 1/2 hour and now she's off again.
Little solo chick is not so very small anymore, sitting up, looking around, wandering the tuppernest, starting to preen and napping. Likes to nap does this one. Prefers to nap at his/her parents' feet though whether they are actually in the tuppernest with him/her or perched on the edge. Chick is ten days old today but Jules is so protective that I suspect she'll stick closer for longer. And being a solo, this chick won't fuss about it - Mom and Dad are its chickpile after all. On the other hand, being a solo, this chick will probably (yes, this is a generalization) fledge early because s/he doesn't want to be left behind anymore. We have had 4 nests with solos and they all fledged a bit early as I recall. Ibon and Ena were incident free. Sherpa went very early, went to ground, was re-released as he was uninjured - he turned up in Winnipeg a few years later. Heather was our only solo Brandon chick - she did injure herself at or shortly after fledging and was non-releaseable.
