There are always down sides

Things are still progressing well with barn owl breeding in our areas. Only this last weekend we found two ‘new’ breeding pairs, one on four eggs.

But also this weekend we visited a box which in early May had three eggs. We hoped to find three good sized chicks in the box. There were three chicks, but all had died, seemingly within the last week or so. There were no signs of external attack, no signs of lack of food, but also no signs of the adult birds in the box or on two nearby boxes.

This has left us perplexed – we have no real idea, just a few theories, as to what has happened here.