Salisbury Cathedral has seen its first peregrine falcon chick of the year hatch.

With three more eggs to go, it is expected that the rest should hatch within the next few days, just one week before the coronation of His Majesty King Charles III, with the Cathedral dubbing the young, feathered quartet of siblings the “Coronation Chicks.”

The peregrine falcons have become a mainstay at Salisbury Cathedral for several years, fledging chicks there every year since 2014 except for 2018.

Peregrine expert Granville Pictor, who maintains the Cathedral’s blog about the falcons, said in his post on Thursday, March 31 that “both of our resident birds are unringed, so we have no idea where they were born or indeed whether they are the same two birds which bred last year or indeed as long ago as 2019.”

The Cathedral has produced livestreams on its website documenting the activities of the falcons over the years. The cameras first captured the hatchling nestled underneath its mother at 11.19am on Tuesday, April 24, with both mother and chick playing with the two halves of the empty shell.

Fully breaking out of its shell is a lengthy process for the chick, taking approximately 72 hours to chip away at the shell using a hard-pointed area on its beak known as the egg tooth.