Birds of prey etc.

mellman01

How many of you guys and galls have birds of prey where you live?, I live about 15 miles from a place called Watlington it’s the place where they reintroduced European red kits from Spain, since then they have been so successful they have stopped the program a few years back, I must say we have so many of them round here they are becoming common but I always find myself stopping to watch their lazy flight over the houses here in our village just like when Concord went over I always stopped and looked up at that incredible plane.
Also we have quite q few Buzzards and Kestrels around here. The field opposite is cut form hay in mid summer and it’s incredible to watch as the sky fills up with kites and Buzzards who swoop down after the field mice.
Another amazing thing I have seen is kites performing a courtship on the wing, once they were exchanging an offering of prey one would drop it and the other would swoop and catch it on the wing, but the best thing I have seen is a breeding pair linking talons and spiralling down through the sky.
Sorry I’m rambling but I just love to see so many birds of prey on the wing, in spring they also get really close to my gliders and will follow them for some time that’s cool to see as well.
But if I could have one wish when I shuffle of me old mortal coil I would want to be reincarnated as an albatross and wander the southern oceans. Sad aren’t I!.

mellman01

Hi pixy HA!!, it would help if I got me oceans right, they mostly traval the northern hemisphere!, flippin muppet I am :oops:

mellman01

Is that the female species always seen with a big brood of chicks commonly known as Chavus copulates, they tend to wear JB sports track suits and have an Essex face lift or is it the male of the species Chavus Nova drivacus, the mating ritual is a noisy affair and you normally hear them first, they tend to have loud thumping bass emanating from their female attracting chariot, normally a Vauxhall Nova bedecked with various odd but highly visible, purchased but more normally stolen from the local Halfords?.

robertls

Errrrrr........right...

Red Kite
Buzzard
Osprey...........passage migrant
SHort eared owl
Long eared owl
Tawny owl
Barn owl
Little owl
Merlin
European Eagle owl..............escapee from Wildlife park
Kestral
Sparrow hawk

Anyone still awake????????

Oh yes....................Hobby

Rob x

page35

Hi Mell
no birds of prey here, sadly. but like pixy i enjoyed reading your first post, i could imagine what you see, lovely mell.

mellman01

robertls wrote:

Errrrrr........right...

Red Kite
Buzzard
Osprey...........passage migrant
SHort eared owl
Long eared owl
Tawny owl
Barn owl
Little owl
Merlin
European Eagle owl..............escapee from Wildlife park
Kestral
Sparrow hawk

Anyone still awake????????

Oh yes....................Hobby

Rob x

I'm impressed rob, we have Merlins at the power station I have seen a Merlin here a couple of times and up at Whittenham clumps there was a short eared owl.
But I must say I'm really impressed with the European Eagle owl now they are big enough to take a dog,by heck I bet it's amazing to see it flying!.

mellman01

page35 wrote:

Hi Mell
no birds of prey here, sadly. but like pixy i enjoyed reading your first post, i could imagine what you see, lovely mell.

Hi page glad you like me ramblings I just had spare mo so decided to to put mouse to lap top.

annie_mial

I loved it, too, Mell, positively lyrical!

We don't get much in the way of birds of prey, plenty of owls of all kinds, I suppose, kestrels and the odd sparrow hawk.

I see those bl**dy green parakeets can now be shot, anyone got a gun I can borrow?

Annie

mellman01

annie_mial wrote:

I loved it, too, Mell, positively lyrical!

We don't get much in the way of birds of prey, plenty of owls of all kinds, I suppose, kestrels and the odd sparrow hawk.

I see those bl**dy green parakeets can now be shot, anyone got a gun I can borrow?

Annie

Hi Annie thanks as well I didn't think I had that much of a writing ability, it's just that nature especially birds of prey really leave me awe struck even at my age, it's a feeling I have carried with me since I was a nipper growing up and playing in the fields and woods of my home village of Ispden .

Oh parakeets, try putting up an owl decoy or two in your garden it might move them on for you.

annie_mial

Not seen one of those, Rehab, but I keep tripping over Greater Spotted Twits everywhere :!:

Annie

robertls

annie_mial wrote:

Not seen one of those, Rehab, but I keep tripping over Greater Spotted Twits everywhere :!:

Annie

Heck Annie..............................Oh!!!!!! twits..................Sorry I misread that............twits

Rob x

joanlawson

mellman01 wrote:

How many of you guys and galls have birds of prey where you live?, I live about 15 miles from a place called Watlington it’s the place where they reintroduced European red kits from Spain, since then they have been so successful they have stopped the program a few years back, I must say we have so many of them round here they are becoming common but I always find myself stopping to watch their lazy flight over the houses here in our village just like when Concord went over I always stopped and looked up at that incredible plane.
Also we have quite q few Buzzards and Kestrels around here. The field opposite is cut form hay in mid summer and it’s incredible to watch as the sky fills up with kites and Buzzards who swoop down after the field mice.
Another amazing thing I have seen is kites performing a courtship on the wing, once they were exchanging an offering of prey one would drop it and the other would swoop and catch it on the wing, but the best thing I have seen is a breeding pair linking talons and spiralling down through the sky.
Sorry I’m rambling but I just love to see so many birds of prey on the wing, in spring they also get really close to my gliders and will follow them for some time that’s cool to see as well.
But if I could have one wish when I shuffle of me old mortal coil I would want to be reincarnated as an albatross and wander the southern oceans. Sad aren’t I!.

Hi Mell

I don't think I have ever seen any red kites around where I live, so I really enjoyed reading your description of them. How amazing to see their courtship on the wing. That is all very romantic, isn't it, that they exchange an offering, and then link talons in that way. Do they stay soulmates for ever after that? I hope so.

Joan

babette

Hi Mell

We've got masses of buzzards, see at least two or three every day, kestrels and a pair of peregrine falcons nesting in the crags above our house. It all goes still and silent when they go out on the hunt! They swoop down the road like bullets from a gun in search of poor unsuspecting wee birds.....amazing!

B x

mellman01

Hi Mell

I don't think I have ever seen any red kites around where I live, so I really enjoyed reading your description of them. How amazing to see their courtship on the wing. That is all very romantic, isn't it, that they exchange an offering, and then link talons in that way. Do they stay soulmates for ever after that? I hope so.

Hi Joan not sure if they pair for life or not?, I'll have to have a look on google.

Oh almost forgot to say, my wife was walking our dogs through the snowy spell and she said it was amazing how many signs there were of birds of prey having made a kill, also she could see where the foxes had been hunting. nature raw in tooth and claw.

noeltone

Hi Mell we have fantastic Marsh Harriers around my way hunting low over the reed beds or high in the sky and hen harriers to the west of the county .I saw a Buzzard the other day and we sometimes get Ospreys out of their mating season, many kestrels and once had a sparrow hawk briefly on my fence yonks ago have seen red kites in Bucks and up in Scotland

noeltone

How interesting marsh harriers theyre so common ummm not

mellman01

Hi babette we have buzzards here and some sit on the lights on the local bypass and I see one quite often on the fence posts by the main road by a donkey sanctuary, cars don’t phase them one bit!, and noeltone you are making me jealous I have never seen a marsh harrier, we do have Goshawks here but I have never seen one, I love them really nice looking raptor, it’s nice to see so many these day’s years ago game keepers use to kill them all off, it’s a bit like that with badgers at the moment, I mean who was here first anyway them or us as for badgers the use of strategically placed mineral blocks has been shown to work by one farmer, if I owned a farm I would try anything other than killing them off first, we shouldn’t try and live without nature but rather hand in hand with it, if we don’t we will be the poorer for it, eh up I’ve turned into a eco warrior! :roll: