Fight, then sleep tight

Lady with her days-old eaglets SE27 and SE28 at Sydney White-bellied Sea-eagle cam. (Warning for sibling rivalry, as well as some flies photobombing a few screenshots.)

Early this morning. Dad guarding his family from a branch of the nest tree.

Breakfast for the bobbleheads.

One eaglet peeking out, the other is under Lady. I'm not sure which chick is which at this point.

Lady aerating the nest, and the other baby peeking out as well.

 

The chicks by themselves for a bit, guarded but not covered.

 

Bonk surprise!

 

Uh-oh.

 

Time for some more sibling rivalry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And they fell over.

 

 

 

Are you kids starting to be done?

Sleepy cuddles for the rest of the post.

 

They wake up for a bit to look around every once in a while, then doze off again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Both seem to be growing and eating well, so I'm not concerned about the rivalry. Fighting is normal for raptor chicks, and with sea eagles (genus Haliaeetus) it tends to stay at establishing a pecking order, so long as there's enough food for all chicks (while for booted eagles - genera in the subfamily Aquilinae - it's more common for only one chick to fledge even if more hatch).

Since we're on the topic, I am aware of the one siblicide that occurred at this nest. In SE21 and SE22's case in 2018, there was a sudden food shortage as a result of, I believe, Dad getting injured and being unable to fish for a while. This sadly caused the older chick SE21 to kill her younger sibling to eliminate competition for food, her survival instincts picking up on that if the situation continued for long, either her sibling would starve or she would starve, and she would rather it not be her. SE21 went on to fledge, and to make a full recovery after being injured as a fledgling and rescued, and I wish nothing but the best for her.

Exceptional circumstances bring exceptional outcomes (sometimes the other way around, too), and while nothing is of course guaranteed in nature, I see no reason to expect this year's eaglets' sibling rivalry to get intense enough to lead to tragedy. They'll squabble over food and sometimes seemingly nothing, but most likely will get used to having to share the nest and get along, as babies of their species usually do.