Chicks!

Last month, our parakeets, Peace and Joy, started nibbling and nudging every wooden object that was more than five feet above the ground.

It was cute. Then annoying. Then I got it! Wild parakeets nest in holes that they carve for themselves out of tree trunks. They want a nest!

So I got a nest box and they quickly set up house keeping. Peace sat in the the box quietly while Joy sat outside and sang to her. Then he started feeding her (a behavior that looks like kissing).

Eventually, over the course of a week or so, she laid 4 perfect eggs, each the size of a penny.

And a few days ago, we heard the sweetest tiny cheeping... and now we are hearing two kinds of tiny cheeps. They sure grow fast! The older chick is about 4 days old here, and the younger is 1 day old. You can see the older chick has more than doubled his size in 4 days!

Sorry for the fuzzy picture, we only get to see them when both parents are out of the nest (a fairly rare occurrence), and then for only a short time.

Joy has started sleeping in the nest box so that he can help feed the chicks at night. What a good Dad!

I had been told that parakeets usually only manage 1 or 2 chicks out of their first clutch, but we think these chicks are from the first 2 eggs laid, so all the eggs may be fertile.

We won't count our chicks before they are hatched, though!