Week 4 - 23rd April 2006

She laid her first two eggs on the morning of Tuesday 25th April and continued to lay a single egg each day afterwards until the 29th April.

Each morning Fidge - we can't keep calling her "she" and she fidgets a lot so "Fidge" it is - leaves the nest box before 6AM and the eggs are usually mostly visible. Later in the morning, before midday, she returns to the nest and covers them with nest material. Whether this is for camouflage or to either keep direct sunlight off them (which enters the hole from midday onwards) or prevent them from chilling I'm not sure.

During the day time, the pair are seen in and around the garden. He occasionally offers her a morsel of food, which she takes, though she is often on the sunflower hearts and suet feeders. The Greenfinches have been on the receiving end of a defensive mother's bill, taking on 4 Greenfinches on one occasion. Towards the end of the week, she has returned a few times during the day time with small fronds of fern and other vegetation and placed them around the outside of the cup.

In the evening, Fidge has returned to the nest box earlier each day until on Friday (28th) she was in the nest before 7PM. Some evenings the male has entered the box briefly - on one occasion he brought her a sunflower heart which she promptly threw out of the nest box, as if to say "I'm not having crumbs in my bed".

On returning to the nest in the evening she has spent a lot of time "weaving" the lining of the nest cup, which seems to consist of fine grasses, animal hair and downy feathers (or something similar).

25th April  - 2 eggs	26th April - 3 eggs
27th April - 4 eggs	28th April - 5 eggs
29th April - 6 eggs	Fidge on her clutch of eggs