05 October 2022
Reset!
Got back from a tough tour around South Africa yesterday evening and I immediately climbed the ladder to check on the owls. One chick in the box, . . . the other on the step, and the female on the roof under the box. The chick on the step took one look at me and hurriedly joined its’ sibling in the box, while the female swooped off to the acacia at the back of the building. The second clutch of three eggs has been pushed right to the back of the nest and are not being incubated by the female so they are unlikely to hatch – a big relief! It would have been a really tough task raising both broods simultaneously and one, or possibly both lots of chicks could have died if the eggs hatched.
A worry is that Cynthia has not been seeing or hearing the male during the past few days. No sign of him last night either, but I will search today and update later.
By Geoff Lockwood