Stone Curlew 2: late April 2010

Stone Curlew (Burhinus oedicnemus): young chick (above), with anxious parents (below) The pair of Stone Curlews (Burhinus oedicnemus), featured in the previous post, were first detected on 22/03, and successfully photographed on 23/03 and 25/03. At least one, and often both birds were regularly observed in the same corner of the field for over two weeks, so it seemed likely that they were attempting to breed.

Finally, on 15/04, I was treated to a brief glimpse of the recently-hatched chick and its two rather anxious parents.
The two photographs above were taken from a well-concealed position behind a stone wall.
Since the first sighting, the young bird has been located by ear on a number of occasions at various points in the field, with one or other of the parent birds present in the vicinity. The chick itself is extremely difficult to spot in the lush grass between the Tagasaste (Chamaecytisus proliferus) bushes.
On the Western and Central Canary Islands, it is the distinctus subspecies which is found. According to "Shorebirds of the Northern Hemisphere" (Richard Chandler), in the nominate species: "the male has a more contrasting lower dark border to the white lesser-covert bar, and may have darker moustache and yellower legs than the female". The precocial young fly completely at 36-42 days.