I’ve been watching a pair of Bush Thick-knees nesting in an inner Brisbane park for several weeks. Day after day one of the parents would be sitting in the same spot, and mostly facing the same way. Occasionally the brooding bird would be sitting at an angle – perhaps it was the relief parent.
Today I noticed that the watching parent had shifted location and that the brooding bird had left the nest scrape. “Aha, they’ve hatched”, I thought. I was looking forward to seeing some cute chicks.
Before searching for the parent with the chicks, I decided to have a look at the abandoned nest – to see if I could find some egg shells. When I approached the nest, I found a well-camouflaged egg about the size of a small chicken egg. I presume the parents abandoned it when it failed to hatch. I understand that thick-knees normally lay two eggs, so perhaps the parents decided to move on when one hatched and the other didn’t.
I found the other parent sitting about 15-20 metres from the nest site – presumably concealing the chick that hatched. As I was carrying my mobile phone, I took a few fuzzy pictures of the egg. I have placed a couple of pictures on Tom Tarrant’s website (ABID) – http://www.aviceda.org/abid/birdimages.php?action=birdimage&bid=483&fid=38&p=24&pagesize=1 and http://www.aviceda.org/abid/birdimages.php?action=birdimage&bid=483&fid=38&p=26&pagesize=1
Hopefully it was a case of a bad egg rather than the parents being forced off the nest.
Regards, Laurie. ===============================
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