Quite a few of the eggs in Box2 have now hatched. The relationship between the two hens is still a little strained.
Here Bess has some food and is passing it to Spikey.
Spikey in turn then tries to feed one of the chicks.
That all looks fine! But it doesn't always go as smoothly as that!
When not searching for food, Bess sits on Spikey in various positions.
This looks reasonably comfortable for them both.
Spikey is hardly visible here - you can see her tail at the bottom of the picture.
A few seconds later, Bess went off again - searching for more food I expect.
This picture was taken nearly 10 minutes later. It looks like Bess on the nest and Spikey standing above her with some food.
All looks as though the transfer . . .
. . . is going smoothly, but Spikey doesn't want to let go of the food item she has found.
She withdraws and Bess follows her . . .
. . . until she has to let it go.
Suddenly, Spikey leans forward and passes it to Bess.
You can clearly see the food in Bess's beak.
But instead of feeding it to a chick . . .
. . . like Spikey earlier, she eats it herself!
This is the only picture we have found that shows a piece of eggshell. But what a piece. It looks like an entire egg!
Unfortunately, after this picture was taken we have a gap of two days without any records from inside this box. By the time the record restarts, we seem to be down to 8 chicks and 5 unhatched eggs. Where the rest went we do not know!
The final two pictures today show the state of the other two nest boxes. In Box1, there are now at least two eggs. Two eggs would imply that the first one was laid yesterday (Tuesday 17th May). Poppy only just finished her nest building in time!
(It turns out later that there must have been three!)
And in Box3, Chris's 8 eggs are still all intact. They should hatch any day now!