The chicks on the right missed out this time because they did not grab the mealworm quickly enough.
We have been spending the time watching Box2 as having missed the flight of the first two chicks, we don't want to miss these, and currently we cannot have i-Catcher monitoring both at the same time. (We will be able to next year!) However by late afternoon we decided that they wouldn't fledge today so we switched to Box1.
With two chicks hatching out two days after the other four, it is not surprising that there is a great deal of variation in the development of these chicks. On the left, the chick with the gape at the front of the nest is clearly much less well developed than the one facing away from the camera at the back. Again on the right, you can see the two smaller chicks with their mouths wide open at the bottom right of the picture. We are pleased that they have got on as well as they have, but would not be surprised if these two chicks fledged a couple of days after the others.
