Before I start my post for today I wanted to just note that the page views for my blog have now exceeded 200000.  I have posted  1750 posts….. That's three times more pages than War and Piece!   Blogging is a fantastic way for ordinary  people like myself to communicate with the world around them.  Thank you Sir Timothy Berners-Lee.

Immediately on arrival today I  could sense  a change.  As I parked the car I saw a peregrine flying strongly  over my head,  it was the tercel and the first time I had seen one well away from the nest site. 
At the site and now from my hide, the falcon was in the favourite tree, nothing new there.  I looked through the binoculars at her but  was surprised to hear the guttural  clucking that is associated with feeding.  The tercel was on the nest ledge!  This is the first occasion that I  have seen the male feeding the chicks this year. Last year when the chicks were much older both birds had fed the youngsters.  It seems that we have reached the stage where this duty is shared. The female remained on the tree, calling grumpily throughout.  When feeding was over, he then flew up to the tree to a perch above her as normal and they continued to grumble to each other.

Now the sad part.  I had said when I left yesterday that the younger chick which had hatched two days later and was 12 days old , looked a bit worse for wear. It seems  as though it has succumbed overnight because when the observed feeding took place, all I could see was 2 strong heads taking food. This is a massive shame but if it proves to be accurate then it's not unexpected.  Sad as I am, there is also a sense of relief that the two older birds have survived and with the forecast predicting less  rain in the coming week it looks like the remming two will go on to fledge successfully. 

I am observing the nest with "live view" on my camera as I write this, hoping to see the third chick which was not tiny. However, obviously getting wet and chilled had been too much for it to cope with. There is just the slight chance that the bird has survived but this is unlikely because surely it would have been taking food  like its older siblings.
Both parents have been spending increasingly extended periods off the nest these last two or three days and this, coupled with the wet conditions,  has proved too much for the younger chick.  Further proof, if it were needed, of the vulnerability of these birds.   Nature takes its course, one Peregrine Falcon has fallen at the first hurdle.

The two adults stayed in the old tree for 45 minutes until the tercel departed silently.  I expected him to return with prey but he didn't have a kill with him when he came back a while late. The falcon, then after more than an hour, coinciding with a rain shower, came down to the nest ledge where she fed the youngsters unenthusiastically with the remains of a previous kill.  Then very surprisingly and perhaps  unusually, she departed the nest area totally or that is what it seemed, although she could be sitting on a perch that I a not aware of. The  male was also away during that period and there was no sign of either adult for an hour and a half.  The young birds were not only unbrooded but unprotected from any predators.  

Eventually when she came back she went straight  to the favoured tree and called out as if to try and communicate with the tercel.  She still didn't go down to the chicks but instead continued to call.  She left the tree  yet again and this time the male returned but without prey. She joined him again and the calling continued.  They continued to call to each other from different perches but still no prey!   Then minutes later he left again (1553)  followed 3 minutes later by the female, minutes later she was back again.  The tension was building and I was pretty sure that very soon the male would return with a kill? I would describe the falcon at this point as agitated.  Various alarm calls where being sounded around the nest area including a Great  Spotted Woodpecker  and a Blackbird. It will be interesting to see what prey gets brought.  My session had lasted for more than 5 hours and frankly I was hoping that this drama would come to an end.  But the  situation continued with both birds back in the tree and still no kill. I wish I knew what was going on. 
I was quite sure that the male was on a hunt now as I saw him then fly off strongly in to the distance. Then something really different happened.  A corvid landed on the tree and with much calling the female flew down to protect her chicks.  She remained on the ledge with the chicks who were by now starting to call out with hunger perhaps. 
The tercel was getting almost frantic now, her screams becoming even more agitated and intense as she circled around and landed back on that favourite perch. Eventually here he was with a kill, yet another Great spotted Woodpecker (thats four now) and then as a lovely end to my session…..I saw  three chicks, it seems that all have survived after all!!!