Our first chick of the season...is here!!
Today, at nine in the morning, our team was ready to go and check on the Mandy Lu nest. It was its "due date". Plastic bucket in hand, hot water bottle and camera packed....plus the big 20 pound rope bag! A funny sensation of joy and nervousness was visible on the two that were in charge of this important nest check. Would there be a chick today in the nest?
After 30 min of rope work and tree climbing, Shannan, our media leader and dedicated field assistant opened the nest box door and voila!! There it was. A tiny and absolutely perfect macaw hatchling. The first one of the season....the first smile of satisfaction for the whole team.
Mandy Lu nest has been one of the most interesting nest to monitor in the past years. The wooden box was hung honoring Mandy Lu Brightsmith, first and only daughter of project director Don Brightsmith, on the very same week she was born back on 2012. Unlike the other wooden boxes we have hung in the forest around the Tambopata Research Center, Mandy Lu nest box was occupied and used right away. Since its very first year, it has been giving us the chance to learn a great deal about macaw nesting behavior, including big "nest fights" (disputes over ownership of nests), some of them with chick fatalities. The same nesting pair has been using it for 6 years in a row and we know them quite well now. The nesting female, the mom, is quite a compulsive cleaner. She really does a lot of moving substrate ….A LOT!. The nesting male, the dad, is a great forager, always coming back and forward, returning to the nest with huge crop ready to feed his family. So far, they haver managed to fledge 8 chicks, including one of our foster chick last year. They have three more eggs now, and mom is still incubating them intensively. Maybe we will find a second chick tomorrow!!
We will keep you posted on our future "due dates".
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