Hatchlings!

As expected and hoped, when I checked my purple martin colony today I found my first hatchlings, five in one nest, hatched yesterday, and four in another, hatched today. The instructions I have say that I may have to nudge them around in order to count them, or take them out to measure them against the day-by-day growing chart, but they are so tiny and fragile I couldn’t bring myself to do it, and besides, I was able to count them without nudging, and one clutch was clearly born today, with the other a day larger, so I didn’t have to pick them up (though I may have to stir up my courage as the remaining couple of dozen eggs hatch over the next two weeks). Here’s a picture of a clutch of day-olds, not mine but pretty much like them: