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On a monitor next to my easel a live feed relays footage from inside a kestrel nest located a short stroll away from my Yorkshire Wold studios. On the screen I can see a young kestrel pair fuss over their newly-hatched chicks. Whilst the female diligently shares out dinner, the male heads out to hunt for more.

 

Their interactions are so slick you could be forgiven for thinking the pair have done this before. In fact, it is this pair’s first ever brood. Nicknamed Jeff & Jenny by followers of a livestream of this nest on my YouTube channel, this pair are fascinating to watch.

In the lead up to hatching, Jeff proved an attentive partner, arriving at the nest several times a day to take his turn on the eggs. Although, interestingly, as soon as he settled down to brood he instantly fell asleep which made me wonder if he was enjoying the excuse to snooze.

Now that the chicks are here it is heart-warming to watch this young kestrel couple work together so efficiently, especially since Jeff is a chick I rescued and is particularly special to me.

I have followed his story closely from the moment he hatched. He was the youngest of a clutch of six kestrel chicks whose mother disappeared suddenly last year.

Mrs Kes, as she was known, had raised several clutches in the valley below my Thixendale home, and had been a very attentive mother.

So it was a shock when one night she left the nest never to return. I suspect looking back that she was actually unwell because it is very unusual for a kestrel to abandon its chicks.

Mrs Kes’ six chicks were too young to survive and so I took the weakest three – one of whom was Jeff - into my care and then returned him and his two siblings to their wild nest once they were strong enough.

At this point their incredible dad, Mr Kes, took over. Male kestrels are not known to feed or brood their chicks but Mr Kes defied convention and brought the brood up alone – with a bit of support from me.

As the chicks grew, it was easy to pick Jeff out. He was always up front at mealtimes and his cheeky character meant he quickly became my favourite.

But when, one by one, Jeff's siblings learned to fly and dispersed, Jeff was slow to follow. He was the last to fledge and then never left the territory.

Jeff's continuing presence here at Fotherdale was the cause of some confusion and for a while Mr Kes, who by the autumn of that year was ready to begin courting again, seemed to mistake him for a female.

I knew by the fact that Jeff was ringed that Mr Kes was ‘flirting’ with one of his own chicks, but at that point I didn’t realise ‘Jeff’ was male and not female.

Male juvenile kestrels don't get their distinctive grey/blue feathering until they are around a year old and so it is easy to confuse young males with females since at this stage they both have red-brown feathers.

Not much is known about inbreeding in kestrels and so I followed the interaction between Mr Kes and his chick with interest. Neither kestrel attempted to mate, but their behaviour was oddly familiar.

In December, Mr Kes suddenly disappeared. He had lived here a number of years and after watching him raise his chicks alone last year, I felt his loss keenly.

But then, on the 4th of May, Jeff turned one-year old – the age at which kestrels are ready to begin families of their own – and I began to hope that I could would get the chance to watch kestrels breeding here again.

But whilst Jeff was old enough to court, and whilst it was now very clear he was a male, he seemed very inept at the whole business. In fact the first female he managed to draw, he promptly chased away again.

When male kestrels are trying to attract a mate they tend to find a suitable nest site and then sit in the entrance nodding and calling.

Jeff was so enthusiastic at nodding he looked like his head may fall off! So it was very disappointing to see him then round on this potential new partner and chase her aggressively away.  

I’ve noticed that once a female is in the vicinity, male kestrels will ramp up their performances - showing off with elegant display flights in which they use fast, shallow wingbeats to hover, then stooping into the entrance of their preferred nest site.

It wasn't too long before Jeff had finally mastered his technique, and I spotted him not only displaying and calling but this time when a female appeared he offered her a mouse as a gift.

This was a good sign the relationship could work and when the female accepted it, I named his new mate Jenny.

Jeff and Jenny seem to have enjoyed a good relationship ever since.

Their early awkwardness was swiftly replaced by an efficient partnership and it was interesting to see how Jeff swung into action as soon as the first of their four eggs were laid.

In fact the moment he spotted the clutch of red-brown speckled eggs inside the nest he instinctively sat down to brood them.

It’s been fascinating to see this kestrel, whose behaviour with his father was so strange that at one point I had decided he was a female, now become a father himself.

And I can’t wait to see how he shapes up as a dad now that the chicks are here. Of course I hope he proves to be as good at fatherhood as his own dad Mr Kes was.