B127 catches the breeze in the lakeside oak

From beneath the archway, Omar Enrique Berdugo Cabeza watches them in silence: there is B127, perched at the cavity of the oak beside lago 1, preening herself with unhurried calm, taking in the cool of the late afternoon. Inside, in the warm darkness of the wood, the eggs wait. Outside, the male B29 circles the surrounding trees, foraging, searching for the food he will carry back to his mate. Reaching that oak was no simple thing. This pair lost an egg when African birds invaded their previous nest — that small egg, gone and never returned. After the intruders left, B29 and B127 came back to try to reclaim what had once been theirs, but something about that place no longer felt right to them, and they walked away from it. The wooden nest box installed for them did not work either: they excavate downward with the full force of their bills, and the wood was not thick enough to hold — they drilled clean through it, it had to be taken down and repaired, and still they refused it. In the end, they chose the oak. A true tree, with the density and the character that these guacamayas demand. And there is B127 this afternoon, resting easily at the entrance to her nest, like someone who knows exactly where she belongs.