So, barn owls ....



Reiver said:
I had a long day at the match followed by a long hangover today ..... but the enthusiasm, on here, pushed me to go down to grab a photo.

Sorry for the quality but I'll get a better one tomorrow.

You can just see the little scrap of life next to the eggs ..... next one due to hatch on Tuesday.

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Ooh. Yes I can see it. Interesting to see whether you get another. I was fascinated on Springwatch when they had 3 owl chicks in totally different sizes - but they all fledged. Fingers crossed for the owlet!
 
Son of Stan said:
Ooh. Yes I can see it. Interesting to see whether you get another. I was fascinated on Springwatch when they had 3 owl chicks in totally different sizes - but they all fledged. Fingers crossed for the owlet!
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He's chirping away and flapping his stumpy little wings so he's a fighter.

All we can do now is keep the shed warm, feed them and hope ..... just as we do with our kids eh ;)
 
An update with pics:

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Hello mate, I've just been down to see the owls and it looks like the egg at the front is halfway through hatching. It's been exactly a week since the last one and he's rapidly gaining weight and down. Bonnie, the female, hasn't left the nest for a month and is filthy. Skye brings her food but she can't get out to wash. She won't leave the eggs so we have to hope they hatch quickly. I've just found out that barn owls are one of the few species whereby the elder chicks will help feed their younger siblings! We still don't know how many we'll end up with so can't make any plans yet.
 
JonnotheMackem said:
An update with pics: Hello mate, I've just been down to see the owls and it looks like the egg at the front is halfway through hatching. It's been exactly a week since the last one and he's rapidly gaining weight and down. Bonnie, the female, hasn't left the nest for a month and is filthy. Skye brings her food but she can't get out to wash. She won't leave the eggs so we have to hope they hatch quickly. I've just found out that barn owls are one of the few species whereby the elder chicks will help feed their younger siblings! We still
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Oops. Made a mess of that as I lost the internet! Trying to say that the chick looks very pink. And fingers crossed for the other egg.
 
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So, a month's ban without any proper explanation from the Mods ...... that'll help me avoid repeating whatever dreadful crime I committed :rolleyes:

It's been an interesting month. The owlet is a month old and doing everything 'he' should be. We've called him Brodie, which is a Scottish clan name and fits in with Bonnie & Skye. He was only one that hatched and the other eggs have now started to vanish although we found one on the shed floor ..... it seems she knows which ones are viable.

In 'other news' we've taken in, fed and released an injured male Mallard who now seems content to stay. We've added 4 new ducks to the domesticated ones by bringing in 8 week old runner ducks. One has taken to our existing ones, and follows them into the stable at bedtime, but the other 3 refuse to go in an spend the nights on the island we created. We're hoping they breed as there's 2 males and 2 females so we can end up with 20 or so.

The female geese keep fooling us by laying eggs and sitting on them for a couple of days, but then they lose interest and wander off. At some point they'll decide it's time and will sit on them until they hatch, in the meantime they become omelettes :lol: We've had a pair of wild Greylag Geese arrive, almost 3 weeks ago, and we're pretty sure they're sitting on eggs. If they are and they hatch they usually have 10 to 12 which would be great. They've installed themselves on the big lake and Buster, our aggressive domestic male, hasn't bothered them so they should be fine.

We bought a great fluffy little bantam cockerel, named Tommy after my Dad who use to keep them, to put in with our 11 egg laying chickens. Sadly they bullied him in the compound and wouldn't let him in the shed at night .... it was like 'Prison Break' so we busted him out, put him in a great shed of his own and went off to get him a 'girlfriend'. The lady who sells them is great and found us a little beauty. As we were about to leave our lass noticed 5 fluffy little fellas partitioned off and asked about them. My heart sunk 'cos I knew what the story would be and I was right, they were on death row! She had a surplus of males and not enough space for them. So we brought them all home and put all 7 in together where they're very happy .... the lass we got them off will try to place them so we should just end up with the pair we wanted.

Oh yeah, nearly forgot, we have a pair of Mandarin ducks who we think are nesting somewhere on the pond. They're beautiful and it would be great if they had ducklings. We've also taken in a baby squirrel which is a bit contradictory, I don't particularly appreciate them and the damage they do but couldn't just let it die ..... bottle feeding a squirrel ffs, really living life on the edge here :lol:

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Snaggletooth said:
Welcome back, and great update on the owls.
Now, behave!! ☺
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Cheers mate.

I always accept bans without complaint but I've no idea what this was for .... it seems some people just have grudges and abuse their 'powers'.

After the previous ban I'd taken great care not to do anything that would merit one, let alone a month.

Shame as quite a few people were enjoying this thread.

Hopefully I'll be able to post a few more pictures before I'm banned again.
 
Reiver said:
So, a month's ban without any proper explanation from the Mods ...... that'll help me avoid repeating whatever dreadful crime I committed :rolleyes:
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It looks like your usual trick of getting into a heated argument with someone and resorting to name calling.

You post some great stuff on here and long may it continue, but you really need to stop hurling insults around whenever you get angry.
 
Roger said:
It looks like your usual trick of getting into a heated argument with someone and resorting to name calling.

You post some great stuff on here and long may it continue, but you really need to stop hurling insults around whenever you get angry.
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Not the case at all, as I've said I took great care not to do anything worth a ban.

It would appear I've become the 'Lee Cattermole' of the board whereby people see things that aren't actually there.

I don't use bad language, don't troll, don't become personal, don't start arguments, don't post links to dodgy websites or whatever.

I don't get angry, I simply answer in kind .... there's no one capable of making me angry on here tbh.

However, I'd have thought heated arguments are part & parcel of a discussion forum.

It's strange that you ban me, for 'my usual tricks', yet allow people to openly & personally insult me and bring my wife and family into it.

It happens continually yet they're not banned ... some of the Mods not only allow it but actively encourage it and even join in.

Please feel free to post my terrible 'name calling' and see if the decent people, on here, agree it's worthy of a ban.

max wartbug said:
Good to see you back and great news re the Safari Park. Keep the news coming.

This thread is so good we all suffer when you get a ban, so I'll offer to do your "bird" for you in future. Any bans just pass them over here.
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:lol:

Cheers mate, funny and kind.

I've just taken my first look at 'Pure Football' for a month and it's an absolute shambles with threads taken over by endless slanging matches.

And all this with no input from Reiver, the scourge of decent debate ;)
 
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Great news for Brodie - love the name! What a lot you manage to have fitted into a month. Love that you rescued the condemned cockerels, and hope it works out for them.

Really nice that you are assisting the young grey squirrel - although some on here won't agree. I certainly couldn't see anything suffer.

Keep up the good work and the updates.
 

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