Upside Down

As I ended my last post on the raven's aerial acuity, I had to post the photo just given to me by my photographer friend of El Moro's back flying. (If you click on it to enlarge you will see him better.) Imagine his nestling learning that! So far, there appears to be just one baby Moro. Below El Extraordinaire Moro is a photo of both parents and baby Moro at their nest. Their nestling is not feathered out and so younger than the Grog's brood.

Yesterday, I sat with my binoculars searching the Grog nest. Their nest is more obscure than the El Moro's. Earlier yesterday morning with big winds about, I sat with Grog a spell. As he stood still, he smacked the air in an insect feast. The smaller insects he swallowed whole. Then Grog scrounged around the rocks at the cliff edge, finding a bigger creature which he de-winged before clamping shut his beak on it.

I saw an identical movement as I watched the Grog nest--a baby Grog catching a passing fly? Yes, the nest is now wall to wall pitch black with feathered baby Grogs. I caught one stretching a wing and later, one flapping his wings. I counted a definite three bodies but was unable to tell if there were more. I heard one calling to a nearby parent for food and watched Sunshine go to the nest with her throat pouch apparently full, only to change her mind and go cache it. Was she on a strict hourly feeding schedule?

Being feathered out, the Grogs are at least three weeks old, still sleeping much of the time but jostling for position in their increasingly crowded nest, packed so because of their growth. I imagine it will be another few weeks before they attempt to fly.

As parents, the Grogs showed apparent pride as they paired up on a nearby branch after feeding their young. They preened each other, making sweet sounds and joined beaks affectionately. They seemed to be in their own small Eden with the eucalyptus tempering the sea breeze, the cheery bush sunflowers and black mustard, a golden carpet for their claws.