Over the past 2 days a number of people have pointed out the apparent pip in the 4th egg. It’s a neat round spot and very pip-like, but more likely it’s just a superficial stain on the eggshell. It’s probably a dab of falcon droppings or what we refer to in polite birding circles as “whitewash”. As for the remaining egg, we’ve now moved beyond its likely hatch window. This means that 3 youngsters will constitute this season’s entire clutch – same as last year. Again, assuming there is no 4th hatch, we can expect that the parents will continue to incubate the egg for another week or so – in other words, way past any reasonable chance of its viability.

