Day 4: At Least One Chick

It was no surprise that the female was away from the nest when I arrived. I had hoped that yesterday’s torrential rains had not caused her to abandon the nest. It is well protected from above, by layers of leaves that rise 40 feet to the canopy.

It was not long before the female landed on the nest rim and a chick lifted its head and bill up in anticipation of being fed. The chick is now big enough that I can see the small bill and at least half the head above the rim when it does lift itself up. She did not feed it but soon settled in for about a minute before leaving the nest. I only saw one chick, though twice in the span of 15 minutes during the next 35 minutes that she was away, liquid was ejected from the nest. The chicks are able to defecate over the nest rim by the time they are 2-3 days old. I figure that this is Day 4 for the oldest one. Defecating in this manner is their way of keeping their small nesting space clean. Did one chick do this twice in such a short period of time, or was it two chicks?

She returned and spent a little time wiggling her body to bring up food before putting her bill into the chicks bill and regurgitating it. I could only see one chick begging (above photo) and you can see that its eye has yet to open. Are there 2 chicks? Were there ever 2 chicks? If so what happened to it?