New Life

Wedgie eggs take about 5 weeks to hatch, but of course I didn`t know when they had been laid. One day, about 3 weeks after my discovery, I had a very strong gut feeling that the eggs had hatched. Unable to resist I made the journey back to the nest to discover two fluffy little white chicks. With my very limited knowledge of Wedgies, but reasonable knowledge of chooks, I figured these little eaglets (if that`s a word) were about a week old. Moving quietly and respectfully, I settled in and watched them for a few days, careful not to draw the attention of other humans to them.

They weren`t very active, sleeping most of the time, but when they were up and about, one was already showing dominance over the other.

Surprisingly neither of the adults were at the nest through the day. I guess, being the apex predator of the sky, they feel no need to be there to protect the babies. I usually knew where at least one of the adults were, but quite early in this visit the male came out of nowhere from behind me, swooped to within what felt like a couple of meters of me and followed up with a few orbits over where I was hunkered down amongst the rocks and spinifex. He was very clear about who the alpha male in this scenario was.