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Springwatch with Hellsbells


DaveH said:
Just drove to the north east from Kent and loads of them above the roads. A few buzzards, but Red Kites won the bird of prey count. There was one I was not sure of, low over the road, may have been a marsh harrier and was near a wetland area. I had to stop watching it, nearly rear ended the car in front!

Got my camera in my tit box. It packed in last year but fixed it and will hopefully last out this year.
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You’ll never see roadkill on our roads anymore marra because the red kites take the lot. They circle and circle over our main roads because they’re not daft. Beautiful things, what a reintroduction. Gives hope to us all: when we set our minds to something, we can achieve anything including restoring nature
 
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Pantomime Mackem said:
Aye well mebbes I’m wrong
Just like to believe cos we all gotta have hope and belief that nature WON’T die and we CAN fix it
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Evidently most of the dead Badgers are killed by farmers (gassed) and thrown on the road to look like road kill.
You are spot on reference dead Pheasants etc, the Red Kite and of course those vermin Magpies and Crows will take the carrion.
Badgers though are a fair size.
 
Swindon On Tour said:
Evidently most of the dead Badgers are killed by farmers (gassed) and thrown on the road to look like road kill.
You are spot on reference dead Pheasants etc, the Red Kite and of course those vermin Magpies and Crows will take the carrion.
Badgers though are a fair size.
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Badger sett at the very far end of my garden. They regularly come up to the main garden, setting the security lights off and snuffling around for slugs and stuff. Beautiful animals. Dog sits and watches them through the french doors. They don't give a fuck🤣🤣🤣
 
Swindon On Tour said:
Evidently most of the dead Badgers are killed by farmers (gassed) and thrown on the road to look like road kill.
You are spot on reference dead Pheasants etc, the Red Kite and of course those vermin Magpies and Crows will take the carrion.
Badgers though are a fair size.
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Not seen any roadkill round here (run-off from the Chilterns) for yonks marra. What farmers do to badgers is criminal
 
Georgewhitt said:
Badger sett at the very far end of my garden. They regularly come up to the main garden, setting the security lights off and snuffling around for slugs and stuff. Beautiful animals. Dog sits and watches them through the french doors. They don't give a fuck🤣🤣🤣
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Plenty of sets around here but the farmers are precious about the TB outbreaks.
They are lovely creatures.

We get a lone one every now and again.
Every night we get Foxes, one big dog Fox. Ted nearly goes through the window.
I put out suet pellets for the Birds, understandable this attracts them.

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My Mrs (no) a keen photographer took these early Morning last year.
Took a nut feeder off the bird table. Healthy Country Fox.
 
Swindon On Tour said:
Plenty of sets around here but the farmers are precious about the TB outbreaks.
They are lovely creatures.

We get a lone one every now and again.
Every night we get Foxes, one big dog Fox. Ted nearly goes through the window.
I put out suet pellets for the Birds, understandable this attracts them.

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My Mrs (no) a keen photographer took these early Morning last year.
Took a nut feeder off the bird table. Healthy Country Fox.
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He’s a very handsome bugger
 
Pantomime Mackem said:
You’ll never see roadkill on our roads anymore marra because the red kites take the lot. They circle and circle over our main roads because they’re not daft. Beautiful things, what a reintroduction. Gives hope to us all: when we set our minds to something, we can achieve anything including restoring nature
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True. So much is going wrong with nature, but red kites and egrets are bucking the trend in the bird world, then we have beavers reintroduced and otters seem to be increasing. It shows it is worth trying to preserve.
 
There were swifts feeding over the River Wear in Durham yesterday. I think this is the earliest I have seen them this far north, ever! Although I do recall they were very early in arriving during lock down. Hope the expected bad weather doesnt do them too much much harm in coming days.
 
Bakerlooline said:
There were swifts feeding over the River Wear in Durham yesterday. I think this is the earliest I have seen them this far north, ever! Although I do recall they were very early in arriving during lock down. Hope the expected bad weather doesnt do them too much much harm in coming days.
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I seen a few last week while out walking and thought it was early. I haven't seen any since so assumed they were just passing through on their way to wherever they spend the summer.
 
Botchie said:
I seen a few last week while out walking and thought it was early. I haven't seen any since so assumed they were just passing through on their way to wherever they spend the summer.
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When they are whooping above me I really struggle to tell the difference between Swifts and Swallows.
Can anyone give me an easy way to tell?
I think we get both down here in Devon.
Not really a bird watcher, but would like to know.
 
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Georgewhitt said:
When they are whooping above me I really struggle to tell the difference between Swifts and Swallows.
Can anyone give me an easy way to tell?
I think we get both down here in Devon.
Not really a bird watcher, but would like to know.
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Swifts 'scream' as opposed to the Swallows fast paced chirp and appear all black with a small grey patch on the throat. They have short fork in the tail. Their wings are longer and sharper than a swallow.

Always the sign summer had truly arrived where I grew up in Pennywell. They arrived in numbers and nested in the eaves.
 
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herra soul mob said:
swifts all black and wings anchor shaped when in flight, slightly bigger than swallows. Swallows white breast and slight bit of red at top of breast
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👍 Cheers marra, but in the sky, the colours are hard to pick out. The fork tail is easilly recogniseable, but the rest is just a dark shape really. Do housemartins have the forked tail too? Could be them maybe. I get loads on summer evenings feeding above the river out the back of my place.
 
Georgewhitt said:
👍 Cheers marra, but in the sky, the colours are hard to pick out. The fork tail is easilly recogniseable, but the rest is just a dark shape really. Do housemartins have the forked tail too? Could be them maybe. I get loads on summer evenings feeding above the river out the back of my place.
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More likely to confuse housemartins/sandmartins with swallows as very similar size( and fork tails ) .
We get swallows out the back in warmer weather up high feeding late on the day. Out front get swifts who i'm sure just playing at times but screech quite demonically when racing each other.
 
Messing about with my phone today and I realised it has a 100x lens. I knew it had a 3x and 10x but I discovered it also has a 30x and 100x which I had no idea about. So I'm focusing on stuff in the garden through the camera phone lens when a Robin lands on the plastic Herons head. It only sat for about 4 seconds but I managed a quick snap shot of it at 30x.

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Not exactly the clearest photo but I only had seconds to react and it was through the patio windows.
 
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