Procrastinating

It would seem that I am a master procrastinator or something along those lines. On Friday I had to check up on the Honey Buzzards and what should have just been a short trip ended up being close to seven hours as I waited for a food delivery, and then I would leave… Well, I waited for 5 hours 45 minutes at the nest before regaining some sanity and deciding to call it quits. The male was on the nest the whole of this time with two healthy young and they were also clearly waiting for a food delivery. The young picked up old wasp cake and inspected it for any uneaten food, they stretched their wings, pecked at dad’s face and generally looked bored. Never once did any of them make any noise though. The only noise apart from the occasional Nutcracker, woodpecker or tit was the constant buzzing of mosquitos and my back was absolutely covered in bites (through my t shirt) when I got home.

I was beginning to think that the female had decided to leave her family whilst the young were still very small as she has done the last two years and that the male had not got the message. This then got me thinking about what type of communication there is between the pair – would she in some way tell him that you’re on your own now? She was around though as after 5 hours and 21 minutes she landed in a tree close me (after I had seen what I assume was her gliding over the trees 27 minutes earlier) where she perched for 3 minutes (and I am sure was aware of my presence) and with as far as I could see nothing in her talons before then flying off in the opposite direction to the nest. So, it would seem that she had just been unable to find any food and was maybe coming back to the nest to let the male know? And maybe my presence also affected her behaviour? From previous years the male has always seemed to be the more efficient provider but the female must have had a bad day to not find anything in such a long period of time. Finding a wasps nest must be hard work – they apparently follow individual wasps back to the nest – but the reward is great as they can then dig out the whole nest which will provide lots of food. If they are having problems finding wasps nests then frogs are taken instead. It was been quite wet recently which maybe has affected the wasps but should have meant more frogs moving around? Anyways, the young looked healthy so hopefully have been well fed up until now and will hopefully be so again in the coming days and weeks.

male Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk) with two young. Around 10 days old?