Your day's wildlife

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philk56

Guru
Location
WAy down under
Lots of Great Crested Grebes producing babies down here. They are one of the few birds in the Perth area that are also found in the UK (and many other parts of the world). Interesting how some birds become widely distributed whilst others are only found in quite specific locations.
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Poacher

Gravitationally challenged member
Location
Nottingham
Lots of Great Crested Grebes producing babies down here. They are one of the few birds in the Perth area that are also found in the UK (and many other parts of the world). Interesting how some birds become widely distributed whilst others are only found in quite specific locations.
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Cute little humbugs! Annoyingly noisy when they get just a little older and constantly demanding food.
 

Poacher

Gravitationally challenged member
Location
Nottingham
Not today but late yesterday afternoon: needing to walk from central Nottingham to Arthur Johnson's auction rooms (near Notts County ground) to check out some potential purchases*, I decided to take a slightly indirect route along the canal, starting near the Crown Court/rail station. It's a distinctly urban canal, with new-build offices and housing, and old industrial buildings crowding in on both sides, although I have seen unusual (and suspiciously non-native) wildfowl on occasion, e.g. Red-crested Pochard, Mandarin.
No waterfowl in sight until I was accosted by a cob swan, demanding food for his missus and two well-grown cygnets. Ignoring them as I had nothing to offer, I continued to the right hand bend at the London Road bridge. There are nearly always small fry dimpling the surface here - there they were as usual; while I was wondering what they were, Roach, Dace, Chub, whatever, something flashed by my right shoulder, less than a yard away.
A Kingfisher had been lurking in a buddleia alongside the towpath. It flashed across the basin and perched in another buddleia, showing its bright copper breast as it glared at me. I really should have continued walking, but as a keen birdwatcher, stayed looking at it until it tired of my attention and flew off in the opposite direction. I still feel guilty about possibly condemning it to a hungry night.

*Absentee bids left. Missed out on a nice watercolour but gained a 5 tier Minty bookcase for £74.40 including commission. Now in the doghouse as Mrs Poacher would much have preferred the painting to 'yet another' Minty.
 

nickyboy

Norven Mankey
Pink Footed Geese spend the winter in UK from places like Iceland and Greenland. Two important wintering sites are Lancashire and Norfolk. The geese use both sites so have to fly between them.

If you draw a line from Lancashire to Norfolk it goes close to Glossop. Also, the Snake Pass, being NW-SE oriented is a perfect pathway for them to get over the Pennines

Two skiens this morning heading to Norfolk, about 500 birds in total, honking away
 

geocycle

Legendary Member
Riding along Lune estuary on Friday and came across hundreds of greylag geese. I’m pretty sure they weren’t pink foots although they are similar to me as a non expert.
 

nickyboy

Norven Mankey
Riding along Lune estuary on Friday and came across hundreds of greylag geese. I’m pretty sure they weren’t pink foots although they are similar to me as a non expert.
Very likely Pink Footed Geese. 20-30 thousand winter around the Pilling area. There are some Greylags but much smaller numbers
 

annedonnelly

Girl from the North Country
Waxwings! Got to love a waxwing. About a dozen earlier in the week but a larger flock arrived today.

You can tell which tree they are feeding on by the group of photographers with huge lenses trained on it. I'm not interesting in photographing them so I wander off to the other trees to listen to them calling to each other without the distraction of shutters whirring. And watch them hanging upside down from twigs.
 

Poacher

Gravitationally challenged member
Location
Nottingham
Waxwings! Got to love a waxwing. About a dozen earlier in the week but a larger flock arrived today.

You can tell which tree they are feeding on by the group of photographers with huge lenses trained on it. I'm not interesting in photographing them so I wander off to the other trees to listen to them calling to each other without the distraction of shutters whirring. And watch them hanging upside down from twigs.
Wonderful news! I love their sweet gentle twittering. Make sure to examine every member of the flock in case there's a Cedar Waxwing among the Bohemians.
 
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