Observations Of Nature Through The Seasons.

[Snipper]

22 hours ago, knocker said:

 

Quite impressed that a Jay can spot a nut at 500m

Yes and a birds nests as well. They have massacred a lot of birds nests around me. 

Quite see why they are treated as vermin by some. 

Nature is cruel. More Jays and less blackbirds, Robins to name but two. 

[Emz by the Thames]

A week ago I said that I was still filling up the bird feeder as it was crazy busy...a week later and it's deserted! Apart from a woodpecker (who  usuallyonly comes to the fat block feeder I put out in Jan/Feb) and the collard doves chasing off their many babies, it's very quiet now.

Another observation I have noticed is acorns. In recent years, oak trees in our park have hardly produced any acorns because of the gall wasps taking them over - this year however, huge number of acorns.

Edited August 11, 2016 by Team Squirrel

[knocker]

Quite a few of this little fella around yesterday

[knocker]

Finally caught up with the male Chaffinch this morning. On another note I think I've been caught out a tad. I bought an adapter kit for my Nikon P610 so as to be able to use a uv filter, etc, and it would appear, unless I'm being very stupid, that it restricts the use of the lens in wide angle mode. Not the end of the world but a little annoying.

Edited August 12, 2016 by knocker

[knocker]

The Wigeon and the Mallard

 

Edited August 12, 2016 by knocker

[ciel]

I was minded (well half minded) to do some grass cutting yesterday but finally decided against, as the garden was heaving with little froglets. It is an annual event, but I don’t know where they come from or where they go. The nearest water is a wee burn about 500m away at its nearest point to the garden, but it is usually quite fast flowing.

Next month I expect a procession of toadlets.

[Polar Maritime]

Thought i would post this amazing rescue of an Eagle by one brave soul. Well done him!

 

 

[knocker]

Quite intriguing this morning as the sparrows held an early morning convention in the garden. There must have been between 20-30 flitting around with most of them visiting the bird table at the same time. Then a young Wood Pigeon arrived and it looked very funny as it gobbled up some seed surrounded by about 20 Sparrows.

[knocker]

There are  couple of quite elusive small birds on the lake which I'm having much difficulty getting a decent photo of.(as you can see from these two photos). They tend to be out in the lake so I'm near full zoom and they are very quick and spend most of the time diving and coming up twenty yards away. Anyway this was enough to get them identified and they are Little Grebes. So now to continue the sage of getting a decent photo!!

[ciel]

The Buddleia is flowering now, but I spotted just a solitary Small Tortoiseshell this afternoon. On examining the photo below, I think it has a lesion on its back? There were numerous bees and other flying insects on the plant.

There was, however, a garden first this morning – a Stoat scarpered across the grass and disappeared under the hedge.

 

[Nouska]

This big girl set up shop yesterday. She's got a moth overnight.

    

Edited August 19, 2016 by Nouska
Needed to change to a she! the male is puny and most likely will be eaten at mating!

[knocker]

Satellite tagged Aberdeenshire raptor missing in Highlands

A satellite tag fitted to a hen harrier has stopped transmitting in the same mountains where eight tagged eagles "vanished", RSPB Scotland has said.

The hen harrier fledged at a nest in Aberdeenshire in July.

The RSPB said its tag last sent information on 3 August from moorland in the Monadhliath Mountains managed for grouse shooting.

The Scottish Gamekeepers Association said there was "no independent information" on the situation.

Last week, RSPB Scotland and the Scottish Moorland Group, whose members include landowners and gamekeepers, clashed over the loss of the eight golden eagles between 2011 and July this year.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-37107652

[ciel]

That is really bad news, Knocker. There was an item regarding this on the R4 Today programme this morning..

 I'm not anti all types of shooting for sport. The red deer population, for example does need to be controlled,  but wish driven grouse moors could be banned.

Edited August 18, 2016 by ciel

[knocker]

Yes I heard the item on four Ciel but i popped down to see Sidney and to continue my quest for a decent photo of the Grebe and forgot about it. I agree with your sentiments regarding driven grouse moors.

Edited August 18, 2016 by knocker

[knocker]

Oy - I said no photos.

[Nouska]

15 hours ago, knocker said:

Yes I heard the item on four Ciel but i popped down to see Sidney and to continue my quest for a decent photo of the Grebe and forgot about it. I agree with your sentiments regarding driven grouse moors.

I had hoped we had moved forward from the time of these guys.

My great grandfather is one of them.

[knocker]

31 minutes ago, Nouska said:

I had hoped we had moved forward from the time of these guys.

My great grandfather is one of them.

Indeed. Love the photo though.

[ciel]

Hope I’m not continuing to take the thread too off topic, but heather burning is another controversial issue in respect of the maintenance of grouse moors. 

The grouse shooting industry should be treated, in my view, no differently from other industries which have the capacity to degrade the environment and should be subject to proper controls.

(oct 2015, Lower Glen Lethnot)

[knocker]

There was an item on this on R4 this morning. Very interesting.

Water voles to be reintroduced to England's highest lake

Quote

Britain’s endangered water voles will reach new heights when they are returned to Yorkshire’s Malham tarn for the first time in 50 years.

Around 100 water voles will be reintroduced on Friday to the National Trust estate in the Yorkshire dales, home to England’s highest freshwater lake, in what the trust says is the highest-altitude reintroduction of the species it has carried out in Britain.

Immortalised as Ratty in Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, the water vole is Britain’s fastest-declining mammal. The animal was once found in nearly every waterway in England, Scotland and Wales, but is now thought to have been lost in up to 90% of these sites, clinging on in isolated pockets, coastal marshes and backwaters.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/aug/19/water-voles-malham-tarn-yorkshire-dales-reintroduced-to-englands-highest-lake

[iapennell]

21 hours ago, ciel said:

 

Hope I’m not continuing to take the thread too off topic, but heather burning is another controversial issue in respect of the maintenance of grouse moors. 

The grouse shooting industry should be treated, in my view, no differently from other industries which have the capacity to degrade the environment and should be subject to proper controls.

(oct 2015, Lower Glen Lethnot)

 

There was extensive heather-burning back in March in the North Pennines. I commented to my parents at the time how early this was as heather-burning has tradionally been done in the summer. There was extensive dry weather in mid-March and it is probable that the estate-owners wished to take advantage of this to get the heather-burning done because rain-soaked heather tends not to burn very well.

Talking of grouse-shooting all the fells around Alston Moor (where I live in the North Pennines) and beyond are now owned by the big land-owners who wish to have the land for shooters. At one time most of the upland fells were common land for (or privately owned by) local hill-farmers who grazed their sheep on these fells and in my view they looked after the land much better. The local farmers (and their families) had their struggles with cold winters and poor summers but at least there was a real sense of community until about 25 years ago. Now the farmers have largely died/retired with no-one wanting to take their place, their farms being bought up by middle class folk from the South with little sense of community cohesion and the rich land-owners have bought up all the fells for the bankers, judges and businessmen to have their shooting jollies in September/October. Yikes!

Most of the fells have gone back to rushes because there are no longer farmers who were meticulous about maintaining the land and the dry-stone walls have fallen (largely) into ruin. The appearance of the North Pennines has not changed for the better in my view.

[ciel]

Another youngster, but not sure if it is a Greenfinch or a Siskin. I think Greenfinch but a friend, more knowledgeable than I am, thinks Siskin.

Oh, and I discovered a second Swallow nest full of nestlings in the barn. 

Edited August 21, 2016 by ciel

[Nouska]

14 minutes ago, ciel said:

Another youngster, but not sure if it is a Greenfinch or a Siskin. I think Greenfinch but a friend, more knowledgable than I am, thinks Siskin.

Oh, and I discovered a second Swallow nest full of nestlings in the Barn. 

Definitely not greenfinch with the yellow bar across the wing rather than along the edge. I would also opt for siskin.

PS, totally agree about heather burning - many a time I remember the 'controlled' burn running away and the men spending many long hours fire beating to get under control. God knows the loss of all kinds of wildlife just to get a few brace on London tables on the not so glorious twelth!

Edited August 20, 2016 by Nouska

[ciel]

4 minutes ago, Nouska said:

Definitely not greenfinch with the yellow bar across the wing rather than along the edge. I would also opt for siskin.

Siskin it is.  Ta Nouska, I see the differential ID now.

[ciel]

Still loads of warblers passing through on migration.

With no great certainty the below (same bird) is a Common Whitethroat, probably in moult.

[Methuselah]

Just seen something I've never seen before: a dragonfly swoop onto the buddleia and fly-off with a tortoiseshell butterfly. And then eat it!