Hornbills continued

Hornbills Are Out

If you read my previous blogs you will know that I was keeping track of the Yellow-billed Hornbills that were nesting near the dining hall (fondly known as the Hot Spot) here at CCF.

I watched as the male fed the female for the first three weeks that I was here. Then the mudded in hole in the nest box became slowly bigger over the course of two or three days. I did not see the female emerge but suddenly there were two hornbills flying around and the hole in the nest box got smaller again. The adult birds filled the hole back in except for a small slit through which they shoved caterpillars and other insects. Standing near the nest box one could hear the young bird(s) inside begging for food. This went on for another three weeks or so then once again the hole in the mud started growing. Soon I could see small glimpses of a beak in the hole. The hole was enlarged over the course of many days. The parents began sitting on branches of the snag and calling out to the young in the box. It is actually a rather long drop out of the box to the ground so the best course of action for a young bird would be to launch itself into flight when leaving the nest. No hopping about on nearby branches for these birds.

I watched the nest box as much as possible hoping to see the chick or chicks emerge. No such luck. We have however seen a chick in the trees nearby. It seems that only one chick fledged. The chicks can be distinguished from the adults by the color of their beak. Young chicks have a brown beak which begins to change to yellow shortly after they fledge.

While I did not capture the moment of nest departure I did capture photos of the chick as it began to look out onto the big world beyond its small nest box. I also watched an adult hornbill catch a caterpillar and proceed to wack it against a log before taking it to the nest box.