Your day's wildlife

[coffeejo]

They might have been Greenfinches, was it a flock of them?

Never heard the greenfinches in my
garden sing/call like that. Seriously, it was mesmerising.

 

[coffeejo]

Never heard the greenfinches in my
garden sing/call like that. Seriously, it was mesmerising.

I'm now thinking sky lark after using the RSPB bird identifier. First time I'm aware of encountering them, if so.

Yup, binoculars seem like a great idea. Thanks.

 

[coffeejo]

I'm appalling at remembering or recreating music / noise. Absolutely no way of knowing if what I heard on the day is the same as the audio on the RSPB website. Oh well, will just have to go back there and try to get a better look!

 

[Illaveago]

You can also use binoculars for looking at the stars, it is amazing to discover how many stars lie in between the stars you see at night. I bought 2 good pairs in a lot pretty cheaply at an auction.
I find that it is a game spotting Skylarks. You can hear them singing away but you can't see them, usually they are a tiny dot way up high.

 

[coffeejo]

I find that it is a game spotting Skylarks. You can hear them singing away but you can't see them, usually they are a tiny dot way up high.

Yes, that's what I spent most of that section of the walk doing: listening and looking - but not seeing a damn thing! I think I put an extra mile on the walk from trying to follow the song to the source.

 

[Illaveago]

It was a quiet day with just a few gulls milling around, a couple of buzzards did a bit of soaring but nothing until mid afternoon. I saw another group of three swallows flying low East , West , and later spotted a small flock of House Martins wheeling around high up through my binoculars

 

[Poacher]

When we hear a loud bang it's usually a Woodpigeon hitting the dining room or back bedroom window, so when this happened at about 20:15 we didn't investigate immediately. (Quieter bangs are checked straight away in case it's a smaller bird that may be stunned and need care until it recovers - Woodpigeons just bounce off looking even more stupid than usual). When I looked after 2 or 3 minutes I realised this time was different, as the hit position was wet, and water was running down the window. The "resident" pair of Mallard normally take off to roost somewhere else around dusk. It seems this time they may have taken flight in panic. Apart from the window hit, a conifer about 8 metres away in the general direction of the pond is now decorated with about 200 downy duck breast feathers where one of the pair has tried to fly straight through it! When / if they turn up tomorrow I'll look for any visible damage. At least the other birds will have some superb nest-lining material.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

[QUOTE 4243992, member: 9609"]big day here, loads to report.
Buds have started opening on the Sycamore trees
Loads of Backswimmers (water boatmen) have been coming out of the pond and sunning themselves on the rocks ? I know very little about them.
Seen my first House Martin of the Season
And seen my first Bat of the year circling our house this evening.

And then tonight when I opened the garage door to put my bike in - A Swallow flew out, so at least one of our Swallows is back home in the garage. I quickly shut the garage door and then watched the Swallow circle the house a few times before he went back in, so thankfully I didn't put him off.

so to expand my list of return dates (first time I see them go into our garage)

2016 - 19 April
2015 - 20 April
2014 - 09 April
2013 - 13 April
2012 - 12 April
2011 - 14 April
2010 - 10 April
2009 - 11 April
2008 - 10 April
2007 - 04 April
2006 - 13 April
2005 - 18 April
2004 - 21 April
2003 - 14 April
2002 - 09 April
2001 - 10 April[/QUOTE]
The Swallowdom of Reiveria is back in the news! Good stuff!

 

[nickyboy]

All winter I've been entertained by the birds coming to my feeder. There have been record numbers of goldfinch (13 max), lesser redpolls (9 max) and siskins (7 max).

The goldfinch numbers started to dwindle in March. Down to just 3-4 now which I presume are local breeders. The Siskins cleared off completely en masse about 10 days ago. There were about 4 lesser redpolls hanging around up to a couple of days ago but the good weather seems to have told them it's time to move on

So I'm down to the regulars; blue tits, great tits, chaffinch, bullfinch, greenfinch (which only arrive in the spring). Coal tits have disappeared too...but have been replaced by a rather charming pair of long tailed tits

 

[Levo-Lon]

Its that time again...ive protected the pond..they emptied it last year bar afew Newts...

usually 3 Mallards ,so the other male must be lurking

 

[Illaveago]

I went outside about a half hour ago to catch a few rays and to see if the Peregrine would show up. As I sat on my chair I noticed a small dot starting to circle in the usual place.Through my binocs I could see that it looked like the bird I have been observing, it was moving quite fast probably helped by the wind. It continued to soar and then suddenly it folded it's wings and dropped at a steep angle for what I would guess was over a hundred yards until it dissapeared below the tree line. It didn't half shift and so did a couple of startled wood pigeons that flew from the trees where it had gone down.

 

[coffeejo]

There was an injured woodpecker in my garden earlier. No idea what happened to it, but since it couldn't fly, I'm assuming a busted wing. Its legs were in fine fettle though and it hopped off into the field, then the hedge, then up a tree before vanishing from sight so I'm letting nature take its course. Either it will get better or someone else will get an easy meal.

 

[slowmotion]

We have a nest box with a camera. Until yesterday, there was nothing to see, but then a couple of blue tits appeared and half a day of absolutely manic nest building started. The strange thing was that one tit would would bring in a huge beakful of stuff and fluff it about.......and then the other one would pick it up and take it away to places unknown.

The nest box is nearly empty again tonight. Does anybody know about this behaviour?
We thought that we had set the rent at a very reasonable level.

 

[Illaveago]

All appears to be not very well in spawn land. I went up to see how they were doing a few minutes ago. The ones that I rescued and have placed in a container in the greenhouse aren't doing anything apart from turning slightly green with algae.
The control group in the pond have totally dissapeared. I suspect they may have been devoured in the flurry of activity of the tadpoles yesterday.
I think now that the last lot of spawn including the dollop that I tried to rescue was faulty, as after watching them closely there was no apparent change in shape of the central black dot. The tadpoles swimming around in the pond now, started to change shape within a few days.

 

[Cubist]

Ooh, a first for me. Back up at Cupwith, binos in hand this time. Could hear curlew over the moors, but nothing to see. The Skylarks were back out in force, and a couple kept trying to lead the dog along the track, hopping from post to post. She's kept within fifteen or twenty feet of the track this time of year. There were the usual mallards on the water, and a pair and a half of tufted duck, plus a single Canada.

On our way back to the car I thought at first someone else was whistling a dog, but then I spotted the source. I've had to look it up to confirm, but it was a common sandpiper. It landed on the edge of the reservoir about fifteen feet away, and perfectly happily stood on the stones in the shallows snapping at flies. It was very plump and in beautiful condition, and zoomed in with the glasses was a joy to watch. Even better was another series of whistles and it's mate joined it a few yards further on.