Breeding Report at Paradise Park - Life with Ruby

A "Chatter" of choughs - Paradise Park August 2005

During the winter of 2004, two of our choughs died, leaving Operation Chough with just three breeding pairs. Unfortunately, this also meant that two long-term pairs lost their respective mates, and had to be paired with new partners. One of these pairs was housed at the coastal aviary at Zennor - the aviary which produced three chicks last year, and this upset resulted in no chicks being hatched there this year.

However, the "wild food" strategy developed at this aviary by Paul Carter led to the best breeding season ever in our seclusion aviaries at the park. At one point we had six chough chicks, all readily taking bugs and insects collected by park staff, and brought in by members of the public.
After a week it was noticed that one of the pairs of parent birds were not feeding their young as well as the second pair, and indeed, these birds eventually abandoned their young completely. The reason for this may be that the birds were a new pairing, or that the birds lacked the proper parental skills - it sometimes takes two or three breeding seasons for birds to "click" into parenthood.

Ruby aged two weeks

Both of the chough chicks in this nest were rescued, but one bird was too weak and did not survive. The second chick, which was two days older, seemed to be well enough, and was given over to be hand reared. This meant that for an unenviable three-week period I was putting in the same hours as a wild chough parent - starting at 5 am and finishing at 8 pm!

The young bird was given the name Ruby (red slippers), and she continued to develop rapidly. It is only up close that the phenomenal instincts of young birds can be appreciated, and within a couple of weeks Ruby was killing every insect in the house! She was also given regular trips into the garden where she would busily probe under small stones and leaves. She also developed a particularly shrill call, which only a busy parent could love…

Ruby two weeks later!

The birds in the seclusion aviary continued to raise their four young, and eventually all four appeared on the ledge outside the nest site.

Young choughs in the seclusion aviary

Three weeks after fledging we decided to move parents and young into the large flight aviary, so that the youngsters could develop their wing muscles. Ruby was released into the smaller of the two flights, along with the three females from last year, and a female from 2003.

We now have two large flight aviaries, each with a range of microhabitats designed to encourage the birds to probe and search for food as they would in the wild. One aviary has five birds, one has ten - the collective noun for choughs is a "chatter" - very apt word indeed!

Paradise Park Wildlife Sanctuary, Hayle Cornwall TR27 4HB, UK
www.paradisepark.org.uk