As we carried them along the wood paths back to the house the chicks stirred and the ants fell off. About half a dozen were latched on to both eyelids of each chick, but even these relaxed their grip during the walk back. At the house we made them as comfortable as we could with a hot water bottle in an old cat basket, found an inkjet refill syringe and gave them water and some liquid egg feed. Tubby seemed to be ok, but the little one had problems swallowing.

By the third day it seemed that things had stabilised and we tried to straighten out poor Tubby's broken toes, keeping them in position with matchstick splints held by sticking plaster. We even had a photo session, during which the photos on the first page were taken.

That night I realised that Tubby was struggling. For some reason he was weakening. Instead of snuggling up to his sister for the night he went off to one side and turned his head to the wall of the basket. The next morning I found him dead, a massive hemorrhage down the inside of one leg. In falling he must have hit a branch bottom first, causing injuries to the pelvic area that included damage to a major blood

vessel. Our attempts to splint his toes had probably exacerbated this injury and hastened his death.

Losing Tubby made me want Tiny Tot to survive all the more. It was becoming clear that she had injuries both to her oesophagus, causing feeding problems, and to her windpipe, as she was having difficulties breathing. She clung to life for another couple of days before dying of suffocation as her windpipe closed off. The pics on this page show her on her last day. She never opened her eyes before being returned with her brother to the Wealden clay beneath the wood in which they’d been born such a short time before.

The experience with these chicks was a bitter and depressing one, and the implications dawned only gradually. First, and obviously, falling from an open nest was a real hazard and likely to happen from the moment the growing chicks became active. Second, Owly must have had a sibling which fell to the ground and became a fox snack some time before he was lucky enough to be found by us. (Sophie too probably had a brother or sister who perished.) And third, if this went on, the magnificent pair who were trying to raise families in the crows’ nests would one day vanish without offspring.

The experience also drew me back into the world of these tawnies. I’d expected Owly’s release back into the wild to be an end of the matter. We might go into the woods from time to time to see if he or his parents were around, but I didn't expect to become so involved in the lives and fate of the two parents and their efforts to rear young.

Looking for ways to help, in the autumn of 2004 I made a nestbox which we suspended in a beech tree next to the small patch of Scots Pines where they nested. We hoped they’d spot it and use it, but as plan B I realised that -- if they persisted in using the pine nests -- I would have to saw off the branches below the nest and prepare a soft landing on the ground.

On about May 15th 2005 we suddenly spotted the mother back on the nest in which she’d had Owly. The next day, to my horror, I saw through binos a chick staring at me over the edge of the nest. It looked about 15 days old and so well into the danger period. It was already quarter to four. Plan B had to be acted on immediately or there could be a horribly maimed chick on the ground any time. I raced off to the nearest town and bought a welder’s helmet, gardening gloves and a couple of dusters to go round my neck. The normally mild tawnies can attack ferociously if you go too near a nest. Back at the house I persuaded Roger, the gardener, to help me with a ladder. By 7pm the tree was shaved of its rings of dead branches almost all the way to the nest, 35 ft up the tree, and I'd heaped a thick carpet of autumn leaves around the base of the trunk. If the chick tumbled off the nest it would have a clear fall and the landing wouldn't be so bad!

A few days later, on 21st May, I returned from recording a dawn chorus and dropped by the wood to do a check. It was about 7.30am. Something about the nest made me feel it was empty -- I have no idea what as you can’t see a chick if it’s lying down. Maybe it was because the mother wasn’t there, as I would have expected to see her at that time of the morning. I began a careful search of the ground beneath and minutes later found Sophie huddled against the base of a nearby Scots Pine.

Related material on this site

No Homes for Tawnies. Why it's difficult for Tawny Owls to find holes in trees to raise families in, and why so many flightless chicks are found on the ground each spring.

Looking after an orphaned tawny chick. Not to be undertaken lightly! Four pages on care and release.

The First 100 Days. Two-page piece on what tawnies look like as they develop from a tiny chick to a young adult at three months of age. Illustrated with photos taken at five-day intervals.

Tawny Owl Nesting Diary. In 2006 the parents used the nestbox. Account illustrated with pics and recordings.

Nestboxes for Tawny Owls: A big new section as of Feb 2007.

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