All chicks have fledged!

Yesterday there was a lot of wing-flapping inside the bird-box and birds were all the time jumping to the opening to peek outside. They were also fed by their parents when perched in the opening.

The video below shows the situation inside the bird-box about one hour before the first bird fledged. You can see one bird jumping from the opening and going back again.

One hour before fledging

Yesterday evening around 17:00 three chicks fledged despite heavy rain (I just missed it when I was having an early dinner!)

Around 19:30 that evening, #4 and #5 also fledged. I saw it happening live.

The last two birds spent their last night in the bird-box and fledged this morning just after 7:00 within one minute of each other (also seen live)

The last two birds sleeping their last night in the bird-box

Like with previous nests, the mother still visited the empty bird-box a few times this morning just to make sure no chicks were left behind.

This nest has been the most successful to date with seven fledged chicks:

2012: 9 eggs, nest abandoned after cat attack
2013: No nest
2014: 12 eggs, 11 hatched, 3 fledged
2015: No nest
2016: 10 eggs, 10 hatched, 7 fledged

Great compliments to the dedicated parents who kept the food coming!

Chicks should be fledging soon

Here is a picture of them sleeping last night

This morning they are still all there. On the picture below they are together on the nest, triggered by an alarm call from the parents when a magpie was near the bird-box

Like yesterday, one or more chicks perch regularly in the opening of the bird-box and are fed there by their parents (as well as inside the box). I don't see the parents luring them out yet, but that should happen soon.

Alarmcall

At 0:21 in the video, the chicks hear an alarm call

After persistent alarm:

Sleeping

Their sleep is usually not very quiet and you can see the flees walking over their bodies

Wings are getting quite impressive now

Every now and then I hear a quite powerful humming noise in the bird-box when a chick is testing it's wings.

Reaction to alarm call from parents

Reaction to alarm call from parents: all flat on the nest and make no sound

Chaos with 7 young birds in one nest

It looks like the birds need a bit more space now. When will they start moving around in the box?

UPDATE: shortly after I posted this, one of the birds ventures outside the nest for the first time.

Wing testing

I now often hear wing-flapping noise in the bird-box when a chick is testing his wings!

Bird explosion

They are getting bigger and noisier every day

Seven young bluetits

The seven chicks are starting to look like real bluetits now with their greenish down and  white wing bar.

Mum cleans up after feeding a chick

Chicks starting to test their wings

Some of the chicks are now starting to test their wings

Seven chicks, developing nicely

As of today there are still seven chicks left and they are looking good. Their wing- and tail feathers are developing nicely.

Look at their wings!

And some of the chicks have their eyes open now.

Seven chicks left

Early this morning there were still 9 chicks, but by the end of the morning I only counted 7. Strange how suddenly they can die, but in the previous nest (2014) there were also suddenly many deaths around day 5-6.

In the video below you can see one bird swallowing a massive caterpillar. At that time there were still at least 8 chicks (and earlier I counted 9)

Swallowing a massive caterpillar

The video below shows the 7 remaining chicks this evening. It looks like the ones that died are the ones that were much less developed as could be seen in yesterday's video. There is not much difference now:

Remaining 7 chicks look more or less equally developed

Nine chicks left

Although all chicks looked healthy last night, today there were only nine left. So one of them must have died after that.

The oldest chicks are now showing the beginning of feathers on their wings. See for example the one at the top in the video and compare with his younger en much less developed sibling to the right.

Sleeping

Mother brings food

Chick spends almost 2 hours outside nest

This morning a chick was pushed accidentally out of the nest. After almost 2 hours in the cold outside the nest he had become extremely weak. But fortunately he eventually made it back to the nest where he regained his strength helped by the body heat of his siblings.

Watch the amazing video below. I never thought he would survive this.

Chick spends 2 hours outside nest but survives

Later in the afternoon, all looks well

10 healthy chicks

More feeding

The chicks seem to get more active in the evening. All ten are screaming for food and they are well served

Ten hungry mouths to feed

Mum and dad bringing food

All eggs have hatched, so far all going well

Yesterday the last egg must have hatched between 16:00-17:45 because there are 10 chicks now and no egg.

You can almost see the chicks grow. They are clearly bigger and stronger now. In the video below one of the parents is feeding a chick and he /she waits for the fecal sac to come out, which is immediately taken out of the nest.

Feeding

In this stage it is usually very difficult to see how many chicks there really are, but in the picture below you can see that there really are ten and all of them are healthy as far as I can see.

Ten chicks

9 healthy chicks, 1 egg left to hatch

Yesterday night at 6:17pm I saw the 7th chick hatching and apparently two more hatched overnight because right now I count 9 healthy chicks and one egg

Feeding 

Let's see if the last egg will hatch today. I was expected it to be late because it was laid when incubation of the other eggs had already started.

Chick #6 is born

Mother removes part of the eggshell and the baby is left with an eggshell on it's head, like Calimero.

Eventually she also removes the remaining eggshell from the head of the chick

Mother helps opening the egg

Mother helps opening an egg and eats the egg shells to benefit from the nutrients. As I post this, the chick still has not hatched. 

First five eggs have hatched!

During the night or early this morning five eggs have hatched. 

Clutch is complete: 10 eggs

Yesterday egg number 10 was laid and this morning the was no new egg, so the clutch appears to be complete.

The female has now started incubating the eggs. The male gets her some food every now and then.

The male brings the incubating female a snack

I'm expecting the chicks to hatch around May 12th.

Eight...

Six eggs

Six eggs so far...

Three eggs now

I must have overlooked one egg earlier because this morning there are three!

First egg!

The first egg has arrived!

Difficult to see between the white feathers but there is an egg

New nest in 2016

In 2015 there wasn't much happening in the bird-box and definitely no nest. Therefore I haven't posted anything on this blog in 2015. However, at this moment a blue-tit is building a nest in the bird-box again and it looks like it's almost finished.

This happened 4 days ago:

Nest building started on April 1st, only hours after I installed a new video cable!

The bird sleeps in the box every night, but not yet on the nest but perched in one of the light windows at the sides of the box.

Yesterday I captured this footage of the male feeding the female on the (half finished) nest

Male feeding female, 4 April 2016

Are we going to see the first egg this week?