A few mornings ago there was a Tweet of the Day on Radio 4 about hobbys.
A hobby, as you know, is a raptor that is a summer visitor in the British Isles. Its formal name is Falco Subbuteo and, if I may digress, in the 1940s an inventor wanted to call his football game Hobby (his favourite bird). He was refused a trademark in that name so chose Subbuteo.
The swifts arrived in London last weekend. They are often part of a hobby’s diet but usually co-exist with peregrine falcons. However, yesterday Indy (name of the chick) was brought a swift to swallow. This is the first time Nathalie Mahieu has seen this. Yesterday Indy spent ten hours on the ledge above her nesting box and Nathalie expects her to fledge this week; an annual event as famous in Barons Court as the Flower Show in Chelsea.
Indy is thirty-eight days old today. Her plumage is rather dark and she looks rather large. Falcons are larger than tiercels, I don’t know why, but it’s called dimorphism.