Your day's wildlife

[gbb]

Nice walk today avoiding light showers.. spent 2 hours plus just chatting with a various few like minded people
Common Whitethroat

about 20ft away, funnily enough, one of the guys i was chatting with had (almost certainly) photos of the same birds at the same location, i think they were nesting in some nearby brambles.
Also, Buzzard chasing a Sparrowhawk
Cuckoo flew across the vista
Youngish Muntjac
all the usual wildlife too

 

[gbb]

 

[biggs682]

We had a hog in the rear garden last night first time for ages

 

[gbb]

Roe deer , female with milk teets so youngsters must be around too.

Cuckoo twice, perhaps the same one both times.
Oystercatcher

Buzzard
Female Reed Buntings.
Kingfisher a'fishin off a stalk.
Heron

Sedge Warblers
Great Tits with fledglings all over the place.
The buzzard is apparently harrying almost anything that moves, Heron and Little Egret have been targeted apparently. It's nesting nearby so may be working hard feeding young.

 

[Gillstay]

Ant hills in the lawn have finally got tall enough to bring in the green woodpecker. They are 2 ft high.

 

[nogoodnamesleft]

Ant hills in the lawn have finally got tall enough to bring in the green woodpecker. They are 2 ft high.

View attachment 810946

Being rural I love seeing the Green Woodpeckers on the ant nests in the garden. They seem to visit more frequently after ghe grass is cut, I guessed as the nests are more visible.

But cycling around I worry when I see rural properties with lawns more like bowling greens and with multiple patches of white (ant powder killing the nests).

• It's rural countryside, why move there only to destroy what it is.
• Destroy the nests and a food source for a significant part of the ecological balance.
• I worry that the patches of white might not dissuade the woodpeckers and they might end-up consuming the powder as well (or the poison in dead ants. I did ask the RSPB (Head Office) about this but they didn’t know.

Frustrates me when people move to countryside and systematically destroy it eg leaving outside lighting on floodlighting back gardens serving no purpose.

(end of rant)

 

[Gillstay]

100% with you. If you wanted suburbia, why move to the countryside.

Annoys me when people say why do you have so may birds in your garden ? We get hardly any in ours. Then you look and its painted panels, flat lawn and badly, needlessly pruned shrubs.

 

[Dave7]

Nothing exciting but my friendly wood pigeon has just visited.

 

[Poacher]

Makes a change from the more usual pair of Mallards dropping in, yesterday there was a trio of drakes in our small suburban back garden.

 

[VinSumRox]

No pics but been watching two red squirrels quarrelling over hazelnuts on our feeder.

 

[rockyroller]

The pump/fountain in the pond stands on bricks, to lift it clear of the sediment in the bottom so it doesn't suck it in and clog more frequently. Because the pond is too deep for me get in (unless I wear waders) I've fitted a loop of paracord to the lid of the pump so I can lift it out for cleaning. Most of the cord is under the steel mesh panels that serve as heron protection, but the end of it sticks out. It's a heavy lift to raise the pump and get it on the edge of the pond.
This little vandal is pulling the cord. It pulls so hard that the pump is moved off the bricks and topples over. You can hear when the noise of the fountain stops as the fountain head goes under the surface.
I had to reposition it this morning.


View: https://youtu.be/pMAAZouVFiY

that's great! it's work was done, so then it trotted off, too funny!

 

[VinSumRox]

Watching Springwatch and their filming a Great Crested Grebe on its picturesque nest - reminded me of this one we saw in the centre of Leiden whilst we were waiting on a canal tour boat.

 

[gbb]

Probable Reed Warbler with probable Mayfly in beak as it was foraging around waterside shrubbery
(taken at distance and cropped)
View attachment 810565

After further investigation, particually a local buch of birders, to a man they all said..no, thats a garden warbler.

Which is ironic because I was listening intently to one a couple weeks ago, a bird popped up i snapped it, posted it as a garden warbler on a FB page...to be instantly shot down...no that was a Reed warbler (that just happened to appear in the same locale.

 

[Poacher]

Some blurry shots from just now when I was in the kitchen preparing breakfast. I spotted a fledgling (European) Goldfinch on the outhouse gutter, the normal vantage point for Robin to keep watch on my movements in order to beg for food. By the time I'd got the camera, its parent had turned up and was getting a hard time from the fluttering youngster.

 

[biggs682]

Some bugs and insects from our walk around local nature reserve