Today marks the third week since the first egg was laid. Jasper has been relieving Bea of incubating duties, allowing her to stretch her wings. So we are about half way through the incubation stage. The pair should have temperatures in the mid 70's beginning tomorrow and into next week.

 

It's just over two weeks since the first egg was laid on February 16th. We are anticipating that egg hatching could begin the week of March 22 - which will be the 35th day for the first egg. 

In previous years Bea and Jasper's clutches normally hatched in April. In fact April 10, 2015, was the earliest hatch the pair has had since they've been frequenting the communications tower.

Below Jasper is incubating the clutch as Bea is off eating a fish this morning.

We have our third egg of the 2016 season.

Our 2016 season wouldn't be complete without Bea's pine cone. Every year since she first arrived, Bea has had a pine cone beside her to occupy her time while incubating the eggs. Not sure if she actually eats the seeds, but she spends her time nibbling away at the cone. Anything to pass the time. :)

As of this morning we still have two eggs. The first egg was laid late afternoon/early evening Tuesday, February 16th. The second egg was laid Friday, February 19th. If a third egg is laid and the chick hatches it will be at a great disadvantage as the chicks will hatch asynchronously and it's small stature compared to its siblings will not enable it to compete for food. 

Last year we saw a tremendous amount of sibling rivalry between the second and third chick. Amazingly the third chick hung on and eventually fledged.

We have our second egg at 1:49 pm, Friday, February 19th.

 

With Bea incubating the first egg I thought I'd take advantage of her sitting still to get some close-ups of her this morning.

As of this morning we still have one egg.