I think I have mentioned before that Smiley is the most fastidious (or maybe just the slowest) of our resident birds - he spends a lot of time, more than others it seems to me, preening. Nice to have a bird that concerned about his health and appearance but it is counteracted by the fact that he is a slob in the nestbox - he eats in there and doesn't clean up after himself, he brings not just packages of food but the whole darn bird (and occasionally critter) which means most of it is left behind cuz most of a bird-for-lunch is not edible and when he sits on the edge of the nestbox, HE WILL NOT TURN AROUND TO POOP OFF THE SIDE!! Like him but he is a slob for a peregrine - or to be fair, we may just have had exceptional birds up until now and he's a perfectly wonderful, average peregrine. Either way, karmic, or maybe Princess, retribution at sometime after the sunset last night and sunrise this morning - he got pooped on.
the image is zoomed a bit so you can see the white on his head & shoulder
At first I thought he'd been the brave defender of home and hearth and the feathers were muffed up as a result - I've seen that lots before. But then I realized that it was due to another source. Given that likely the only other bird he's been near in the last 12-18 hours is Princess, I daresay she might have been sitting on the box and he was on the sign below and being of excellent manners, Princess relieved herself off the box edge and onto her devoted (not so, remember he's extra-curricular affair last fall) mate waiting patiently below her.
Absolutely my giggle of the day.
