Much of the proprietary software that has been developed by Richard Fernando, the founder of Firecrest Systems, has been named after birds. The content management system that drives our own on line presence and that of most of our clients is called firecrest. It’s kinda appropriate – technology that’s tidy, compact, powerful, high revving, and innovative.
Firecrests – the birds
Little birds, travellers, flock birds, constantly busy, songsters, very neat, extremely successful ecological adaptors.
The Firecrest is a restless bird, constantly on the move as it searches for insects, and frequently hovering. Its bronze shoulders and strong face pattern are distinctive. This small songbird is part of a very large family of old world warblers.
This is the second smallest European bird at 9 to 10cm. The Firecrest has greenish upper feathers and whitish under parts. It has two white wing bars, a black eye stripe with a white ‘eyebrow’. It has a crest, orange in the male and yellow in the female, which is displayed during breeding, and gives rise to the English name for the species.
The tiny size and rapid metabolism of this family of birds means they must constantly forage in order to provide their energy needs. They continue feeding even when nest building. They are insectivores, preferring insects such as aphids and macroscopic animals that have soft cuticles.
Their nests are small, very neat cups, almost spherical in shape, made of moss and lichen held together with spider webs and hung from twigs near the end of a high branch of a conifer. They are lined with hair and feathers, and a few feathers are placed over the opening. This provides good insulation against cold.
The female lays 7 to 12 eggs, which are white or pale buff, some having fine dark brown spots. Because the nest is small, they are stacked in layers. The female incubates; she pushes her legs (which are well supplied with blood vessels, hence warm) down among the eggs. The eggs hatch after 15 to 17 days. The young stay in the nest for 19 to 24 days. After being fed, nestlings make their way down to the bottom of the nest, pushing their still-hungry siblings up to be fed in their turn (but also to be cold).
Acknowledgement