Well, the day has finally arrived - Fluffy's eggs have started hatching.
I came downstairs shortly before 8 o'clock this morning to see if any of the eggs had hatched, and was rewarded by seeing 7 unhatched eggs as usual. Most disappointing!
Here we see Fluffy returning at 5 minutes to 8. All the eggs look in one piece.
Thirty seconds later Fluffy holds the first piece of eggshell aloft!
The first chick has hatched!!
She takes the shell to the exit hole and you can see a pink blob still inside half the eggshell of the egg at the bottom of the picture.
Instead of eating the eggshell, Fluffy is flying off with it, presumably to drop it well away from the nest.
Why do some bluetits eat the eggshell and others dispose of it this way?
Here she holds up the other half of the eggshell ....
.... and removes it like the first half.