The Last One to Leave

All of the eight blue tit fledglings flew the nest this morning. Three had left when I looked on the camera at 7:15 and another four had fledged by 8:20. My photo is of the final fledgling to leave, that hung on for another two and a half hours on its own in the box. I saw 'mum' visit the box when I got back from town, then it followed her out a couple of minutes later. As ever, it's been wonderful following them from nest building, to egg laying, to hatching, to growing so quickly, to fledging. Fingers crossed that they do better than the average survival rate for blue tit fledglings of 30-40%. I've added another collage in Extras, plus a photo of how I managed to keep the box up on the wall after a near disaster - I'm still amazed that the parents didn't abandon the nest after I'd handled the box and that the quick fix held until they fledged. We had a nice 6.4mm of rain overnight, it was quite heavy between 7 and 8 am. I was feeling tired today, so watched a couple of films this afternoon, Twisters and The Wild Robot (so sweet). Looking forward to the French Open starting tomorrow (even if it's about four times as expensive to stream as last year!)