22nd September

The three chicks are still returning to the nest box, but are likely to move away over the next week or so.  the eldest chick is 11 weeks old tomorrow, and just shows how long Barn Owls take to fledge.

 

 

16th September update

The chicks are now 9 weeks old and look like adult Barn Owls.  They currently spend most of the time in the entrance to the box, out of view of the camera.  However wild windy conditions today persuaded them to go to the back of the box - there's no point waiting for their parents to come back with food in daytime with strong winds.  The weather forecast for this week is certainly not very good for owls and we can only hope that enough food will be brought back fro these to survive.  Just up the road from this box is another box where the eggs are hatching and this moring there were five tiny chicks and one egg........these will be very lucky to survive as they will not fledge until end of November.

29th August - growing well

The three chicks are now 6-7 weeks old and are now looking more like Barn Owls than the 'balls of fluff' earlier.   They are also much more mobile and often wander to the front section of the nestbox out of camera view.    The good long range weather forecast and the fact that prey is plentiful during periods of harvesting local wheatfields gives a promising prognosis for these youngsters.    Other Barn Owls in the area are doing much better than we thought possible at the start of the season.

11th August - ringing visit

The three chicks were ringed this morning where it was found that they are all females.  They were very fat, and are obviously being well fed.  Chicks can be aged according to how much of the wing feathers are unfurled out of their quills.  Measurements suggest that the chicks were 37, 33 and 28 days old, whereas we know that they are actually 35,29 and 26 days old, so they are developing slightly quicker than normal.  This may be down to the amiount of prey available.  There are six more pairs of Barn Owls in the same area as this box, so this area has not been too badly affected by the prolonged winter.

the three female chicks - left hand bird is 9 days younger than right hand bird

26th July update

We still have three chicks in the barn owl box, and we can assume that the second and the last egg were the ones that failed to hatch using the details below:-

egg date  & time	chick hatch	difference
05/06 @ 21:15	07/07 @ 11:30	31d 14h
08/06 @ 19:30	not hatched
11/06 @ 20:00	13/07 @ 07:00	31d 11h
14/06 @ 11:00	16/07 @ 07:00	31d 20h
17/06 @ 11:00	not hatched

16th July - third chick

The third chick arrived at 07:00 this morning 16th July.  This will be the chick from the fourth egg with the second egg failing to hatch.   This CCTV is providing some interesting facts - the eggs being laid at regular intervals of three days (wheras it's normally two days) and the eggs are hatching uniformly at 31.5 days.  

13th July - second chick

The second chick emerged from the egg at 07:00 on 13th July.  This is likely to be the third egg that has hatched and the second egg has failed.

7th July - First chick

The first egg hatched today at 1130, which is approximately 31.5 days after being laid.   After a very poor start to the breeding season in the county, quite a few Barn Owls in Lincolnshire are now on eggs or very small chicks.

Fifth egg - 17th June 2013

The fifth egg appeared at 11:00am on Monday 17th June

Fourth Egg - 14th June

Fourth egg appeared today at 06:00 14th June - this is a slightly shorter gap than the previous ones, so it may be the final egg of the clutch.

Third Egg - 11th June

The third egg was laid at 8pm on Tuesday 11th June, so all three eggs have been laid at a regular three day interval.

Second egg - 8th June

The second egg was laid around 7:30pm on 8th June.  This is a three day interval since the first, wheras the normal interval is 48 hours.   This may be as a result of shortage of food and being out of condition to produce eggs.

June 5th - First Egg

Having only updated the blog for 2013 and stated that we hope that this pair will still breed this year, they have gone on to lay their first egg - at 21:15 this evening.   .......... perhaps they were just waiting for us to take an interest!   

Welcome back for 2013

Welcome back for 2013

Apologies for not posting anything yet for 2013, but we hope to provide regular updates from now on.  

The story so far for 2013.

Lincolnshire's Barn Owls have been severely affected by a combination of a very prolonged cold winter and a lack of food due to a crash in both the short-tailed field voles and wood mice.  We are lucky to have any owls in this box with the webcam.   At least they have survived this period, though have been noted resorting to eating earthworms and frogs earlier.  The female spends much of her time in the box and is occasionally joined by the male.  We are hoping that they will still breed this year.

Alan