Calm and order have been restored in loonland!
There are still over 400 of you watching over our loons!
No noise...other than the ones that are supposed to be there on a Minnesota lake at night. No boats coming too close to the nest. Nothing to disturb the loons.
The white spots that you see on either side of the picture and where the picture is out of focus are due to spider webs! They show up more at night than they do during the daytime because of the infrared lights. You can also see them move slightly with the air movements.
Once in a while you will see one of the insects get caught in the web. Someone also posted a picture of the actual spider that is spinning these webs. We can only hope that he won't spin too many or that too many insects get caught in them and block our view.
Today there were thunderstorms all around but we only got "teaser" raindrops here on the loon nest. The iris and other plants are frying. You can hear how dry the material on the nest is whenever the loon moves.
Even at 10:30 at night, the loon is still sitting with its beak open and panting even though it is only 69 degrees and no humidity.
So now we continue to watch for signs that the eggs are hatching. The twitch. The slightly lifted wing. The body being raised just a little.
Tomorrow morning at 9:24am it will be 28 days for the first egg.
Will it be tomorrow?