The Fab Four

On Monday and Tuesday I visited the local site where the four fledgling Kestrels are nesting.
Two of these fine looking birds of prey are still a little nervous and they are keeping their flying restricted to the relative safety of the area close to the railway viaduct where their nestbox is located.

The other two birds and especially one in particular are far more adventurous and are leaving the box for long sorties and seem to be covering some serious territory.

I'm still very mindful of getting too close to these birds, but I have been edging a little closer with my camera and I reckon I just about know the limits of how close I can get without causing the youngsters and their parents any distress...

Hopefully I've still got about a week or so to get some more shots before the class of 2010 finally leave the nestbox and go their own way into the big wide world...So watch this space!

They've Fledged!

On Wednesday I told you about some young Kestrels and that they were due to fledge at anytime soon.
Well yesterday the first of the birds took the plunge and today I arrived to see all four youngsters out of the nestbox, although it would appear that some of the birds had taken to this new flight lark better than others...

Bird 1 had made the heady journey of about 8 feet to a girder in front of the entrance to the nestbox...

Certainly a better effort than that of Bird 2 who must of thought 'if I can't stay inside the box, I'll stay on top of it'...

It took me a while to spot Bird 3, in fact it was only when Bird 2 shuffled along the top of the box that the very nervous looking Bird 3 came into view, having been well hidden by his sibling...

Bird 4 was by far the most accomplished flyer. He had managed to fly out of the box through the arches and right up to the dizzying heights of the top of the viaduct...

In fact Bird 4 just oozed confidence and was happily flying around all over the place, toing and froing between the nestbox and the many perching spots around the viaduct...

Although now fledged, these Kestrels have no hunting skills and will still be very dependant on their parents for at least a couple of weeks yet...Hopefully giving me chance to see how they progress as flyer's as their confidence grows.

Young Kestrels

On a more upbeat note from my previous post...

For the last 4 years I've been following a pair of Kestrels that have nested in a nest box high up on a railway viaduct at one of my local sites.
The pair start preparing the box mid February each year, ready for the breeding to start in the early spring.

The young usually arrive at the beginning of May and the parents then spend almost all of the daylight hours for the next few weeks on the lookout for prey to satisfy the chicks.

This year has been another good year and for the second season running the pair have raised a clutch of four very healthy looking youngsters.
These four little beauties should be ready to fledge anytime now...