Author Topic: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente  (Read 7345 times)

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Offline Kinderchick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #23 on: May 24, 2013, 15:03 »
As if I'm going to buy a baby card with a stork carrying an infant ever again.
Ewww! Hadn't thought about the image, irenekl. But now that you mention it... ::)

Offline irenekl

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #22 on: May 23, 2013, 22:59 »
As if I'm going to buy a baby card with a stork carrying an infant ever again.

Offline birdcamfan

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #21 on: May 23, 2013, 16:45 »
Gaah! That was just plain ugly!

Offline Kinderchick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #20 on: May 22, 2013, 19:41 »
Once again, very sad. :'( Nice to at least hear that the chick was given a proper burial.

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #19 on: May 22, 2013, 19:24 »
Well.  Mom killed another chick today :'(  There's a clip of it, but I won't watch.  According to the blog, she just picked it up and tossed it out of the nest.  The chick was examined and it had no food in its crop, indicating that perhaps it had no appetite due to being sick.  Another horrible illustration of survival of the fittest.  The good folks over there buried the little one...

Offline Kinderchick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #18 on: May 12, 2013, 12:27 »
Thanks for your perspective on this, susha. I know it's all part of nature and preserving the species, but I still can't watch a mother killing her chick. Too tough on my poor little heart strings.  :'(

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #17 on: May 10, 2013, 21:05 »
I couldn't watch them for awhile either, but kept checking in on the nest for a few minutes every few days.  I had a tough time getting the image out of my head of seeing the mom grab the baby out of the nest and certainly wouldn't be able to watch her kill it (I think they have a clip of it on the site).  But it's nature.  She did it because that's what storks do to keep the family healthy and strong.  Just as killing beautiful shore birds and other birds we like (pigeons are also quite beautiful I think) is what our falcons do to feed themselves and their young.  I won't watch those killings either.  It seems worse in this case because it's a mom and her baby, but other animal moms kill their sick infants or leave them behind to die as Lily the black bear did two years with Jason.  It was heartbreaking to watch Lily walk away from her sick cub.  And we all know what a wonderful mom Lily has been.  So I'm back to enjoying the storks :)

Offline Kinderchick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #16 on: May 10, 2013, 20:28 »
Very sad. :'( I can't watch these storks anymore either, irenkl. :(

Offline irenekl

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #15 on: May 05, 2013, 14:47 »
Ahh shoot.  Susha she did finally pull the youngest chick out of the nest, killed it and ate it.  I kept that cam up on my screen while I did other things on the computer and for hours she pecked & picked on everyone in the nest.  It was driving me nuts.  It appeared that anytime one fell asleep she promptly woke it.   Not sure of course that this is what she was doing but whatever it was it went on and on and on.  After years of observing these storks I have never seen behaviour like that. Usually the siblings pick on the youngest/weakest chick until it dies and then it is dumped over the side by a parent. 

I think I need to make the decision not to watch this nest. 

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #14 on: May 05, 2013, 08:41 »
I've been enjoying watching this family so much...but just now, mama stork has been picking away at the smallest baby and just pulled him away from the others...had to turn it off before seeing anything else.  I know that she might kill it...that's what they do.  But I can't watch it happening and don't want to think about it :

Maybe she was just pulling him away to give him some individual attention and when I go back, there will still be four active, healthy stork chicks... ???

Somehow, I don't think so... :'(

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #13 on: May 04, 2013, 10:36 »
From the blog on the stork page:

2235h - Pampering ....

That's what I call pampering, almost the entire day, both dad and mom spoils us by standing next to the nestkom and give us the chicks. Stunning image With the sun right into the nestkom, this afternoon I the boy sitting in the sun slept saw. For just as in small children also need small stork little much sleep and food to be great.
 
In order to devote himself to the fact that there is not enough food for the young storks were a newspaper article I find some premature. Why? because this week and the weeks pass storks will be born. And there can not be a shortage! Absolutely still The first few days that children often eat earthworms, which are really still plentiful in the Netherlands.
 
Mother tried this afternoon even a frog, but just in time she slurped himself but, imagine yourself if they would have. Eaten a young I should not think. Besides tonight there was American (red) crayfish on the menu.
 
Tomorrow (today) the last young? Engbert


So looks like they might have enough food to go around and will not have to "eliminate" any youngsters... :-\

Offline Kinderchick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #12 on: May 04, 2013, 09:35 »
On a lighter note, what a beautiful looking bird that Mama Stork is! Lalalalala. (toe tapping included);)

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #11 on: May 02, 2013, 17:22 »
And there's a fourth!  You just know whats coming.



  :'(

Offline irenekl

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #10 on: May 02, 2013, 09:02 »
And there's a fourth!  You just know whats coming.


Offline birdcamfan

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #9 on: May 01, 2013, 17:20 »
Amazingly, these 3 eggs all hatched on the same day!

Offline The Peregrine Chick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #8 on: May 01, 2013, 16:11 »
Three out of the five eggs have hatched ;D  Wonder if anyone will get eaten this year ??? :P

If I didn't know about storks, this comment would have definitely made me stop and read more!!  :o ;D

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #7 on: May 01, 2013, 11:03 »
I guess we can hope that the other two eggs just aren't viable...that would be so much better...just saying...

Offline irenekl

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #6 on: May 01, 2013, 10:40 »
Yeah the dread is upon me.  You just know with 5 eggs elimination is going to occur.

Offline susha

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2013)
« Reply #5 on: April 29, 2013, 18:22 »
Three out of the five eggs have hatched ;D  Wonder if anyone will get eaten this year ??? :P

Offline birdcamfan

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2012)
« Reply #4 on: June 12, 2012, 16:52 »
I think the storks have eaten a few babies every year that I have watched. It was shocking at first but by the same token. I couldn't figure out how 5 giant stork babies could fit in the nest. I guess the parents decide how many they can feed and which are the weak ones and take things into their own hands. I think there must always be some reason behind this kind of behavior even if I am not a bird/animal expert.
You are right though irenekl. It has been a bit of a downer to watch this, my favorite site have bad result after bad result.

Offline The Peregrine Chick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2012)
« Reply #3 on: June 12, 2012, 16:39 »
Don't be too hard on the storks Irenekl, it is what they do and they are far from the only ones - eagles here do the same thing.

Here's some background information on White Stork reproduction:

A White Stork pair raises a single brood a year. The female typically lays four eggs, though clutches of 1–7 have been recorded. Incubation begins as soon as the first egg is laid, so the brood hatches asynchronously, beginning 33 to 34 days later (about the same as peregrines). The first hatchling typically has a competitive edge over the others and while stronger chicks are not aggressive towards weaker siblings, as is the case in some species, weak or small chicks are sometimes killed by their parents (called infanticide). This behaviour occurs in times of food shortage to reduce brood size and hence increase the chance of survival of the remaining nestlings. White Stork nestlings do not attack each other (sibling killing is called siblicide), and their parents' method of feeding them (disgorging large amounts of food at once) means that stronger siblings cannot outcompete weaker ones for food directly, hence parental infanticide is an efficient way of reducing brood size. Despite this, this behaviour has not commonly been observed.
 

Offline The Peregrine Chick

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Re: White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente (2012)
« Reply #2 on: June 12, 2012, 16:20 »
Link to the webcam for those wanting to watch the storks ....

http://www.beleefdelente.nl/vogel/ooievaar

Offline irenekl

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White Storks - Netherlands / Beleef de Lente
« Reply #1 on: June 12, 2012, 15:43 »
There is so much at the Beleef de Lent site this year that is disturbing for me as a viewer.  First we witnessed the mother stork killing her own young while it was still quite small, now one of the young boys is in the process of slowly hacking to death one of its siblings; in the small owl nestbox there is an erratic and very rough mother who constantly kicked around her eggs and missed incubating at least two of the three eggs at any given time and the one chick they did manage to hatch appears to have been injured by this mom or it has "spread leg syndrom".  They're not sure which yet; the barn swallows are fighting and they're survival rate is way down from last year; and last but not least there is poor, overly committed Pa at the peregrine nest.  
I've watched this site so much over the years and have to say this year it quite depresses me.