Woodland Diaries

epickoala123 said:
*sigh* yet another question.

I have been told that there is a wild black swan around a nearby town.
So................. Are black swans as protective and aggressive as mute swans?
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epickoala
There was a Black swan on a nearby lake a couple of years ago, I saw it a few times from a distance it always avoided people and kept it's self in the middle of the water as far as I could ever see. I don't know what happened to it but it wasn't to be seen the last time I was there. Mind you a new housing development has since been built so that won't have helped.
As for green woodpeckers look on the ground in open fields the first sign is usually them taking flight, A medium sized bird with a yellow /olive green rump is the tell tale sign and possibly the shriek as they fly. If your patient and sit still they may drop back down and you will be able to watch them hunt among the grass tufts for ants etc. Mind you unless the snow drifts melt you may not see anything:(
Keep us posted wont you?
 
dean said:
epickoala
There was a Black swan on a nearby lake a couple of years ago, I saw it a few times from a distance it always avoided people and kept it's self in the middle of the water as far as I could ever see. I don't know what happened to it but it wasn't to be seen the last time I was there. Mind you a new housing development has since been built so that won't have helped.
As for green woodpeckers look on the ground in open fields the first sign is usually them taking flight, A medium sized bird with a yellow /olive green rump is the tell tale sign and possibly the shriek as they fly. If your patient and sit still they may drop back down and you will be able to watch them hunt among the grass tufts for ants etc. Mind you unless the snow drifts melt you may not see anything:(
Keep us posted wont you?
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great advice dean ;) very useful for a amateur bird watcher like myself

as for updating, I have no wi-fi where I'm staying, so I'm keeping a log of birds I see and news from trotters, and will fill you in when I get back.

epickoala123:)
 
epickoala123 said:
I have been told that there is a wild black swan around a nearby town.
So................. Are black swans as protective and aggressive as mute swans?
Click to expand...

They can be..but they come from the Southern Hemisphere(australia) and don't seem fully adapted to our seasos, so their breeding season(and most aggressive time) is often at odds with our own Mute Swans and the UK seasons. Black swans in UK are either escapes from private collections or longer term escapees which have become feral and maybe bred also.
 
dean said:
I have watched them about 10 years or so, but still never See or hear chicks. They circle over to the next farm house (about half a mile away)
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I would bet they are breeding somewhere in their quite large territory, but maybe you haven't located where they actually nest.

One sure way to prove nesting is to listen out in late July/August for the sounds of the nearly fledged young begging for food- it is a very insistent wailing/crying noise and can go on for long periods, and for several weeks, giving you a good chance to locate the sound.
 
Pertinax said:
I would bet they are breeding somewhere in their quite large territory, but maybe you haven't located where they actually nest.

One sure way to prove nesting is to listen out in late July/August for the sounds of the nearly fledged young begging for food- it is a very insistent wailing/crying noise and can go on for long periods, and for several weeks, giving you a good chance to locate the sound.
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Thanks pertinax I shall keep a look and ear out, I hear kestrels a lot, but never have heard or seen any young Buzzard,chicks, only the trio. may be they are passed breding age and just hang around together they must be nearly 10 years old now, though still young for breeding I'd have thought. I know we have some sleepless nights here when the local owl chicks fledge and use the trees in our garden to sit their chicks in as they feed them what a row they make.
 
epickoala I saw a green woodpecker today strangely enough in the wood this time rather than the fields, as usual it was on the floor and flew off screeching it having seen me first.
I also saw the Buzzards (see other post) and 2 kestrels and a lovely barn Owl on my way home which made a kill and ate it on a tree branch as I watched. Sadly I used up the camera batteries videoing on of my clients sheep with her newly born lambs, so couldn't even try for a shot.
 
Today I went birding in the claygn woods and dam near monymusk, following a hint that I may see a black swan.

Unfortunately I did not see the black swan, but I did see the following:
waterbirds
Mute swan - mallard duck - grey heron - greylag goose - eurasian oystercatcher - moorhen
garden birds
European robin - Meadow pipit - European starling - Tree sparrow - house sparrow
doves and corvids
Stock dove - Eurasian crow - Magpie
other birds
Ring necked pheasant - Common buzzard

mammals
Bank or water vole - European rabbit

epickoala123:)
 
I went for a walk in my local park yesterday and saw the most surprising thing: a mob of eastern grey kangaroos!

I know that you must be thinking "big deal" but you have to understand that I live in suburbia (15mins drive from the city), and in all the years of walking in this park I never saw kangaroos before. My neighbours that lived here for more than 50 years, had never seen a roo in the neighbourhood before so that was very cool to see them. I am concerned that they might get run over by a vehicle though.
 
day 1:

didn't get much time for birding after the long journey down, but the time didn't reflect the quality of what I saw. The walk went slowly to start to, but burst to life with large groups of roe deer, mallards, tree sparrow, and gulls. I started to head back, but something on the river bank caught my eye............... a Kingfisher, sitting perfectly still on a branch, until flying off.
year and life ticks:
life: common kingfisher
year: cuckoo, wren
 
day 2: A long walk along the shores of ennerdale lake, and the nearby woods, bore very few results. luckily my luck changed in the car park, with two year and one life ticks.
life ticks: tree pipit
year ticks: canada goose, bullfinch
 
day 4: very aggrivating day walking along the river greta along the abandoned railway line. very little wildlife indeed.
year ticks: dipper
 
dean said:
Thanks pertinax I shall keep a look and ear out, I hear kestrels a lot, but never have heard or seen any young Buzzard,chicks, only the trio. may be they are passed breding age and just hang around together they must be nearly 10 years old now, though still young for breeding I'd have thought.
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I guess Buzzards still aren't that common in Essex then? (they are in the South where I live- you can sometimes see up to half a dozen in the air at once!)

I would still guess they are breeding though- nature doesn't usually allow a 'vacuum' where non-breeders just stay in one place- they may not always be the same three birds!;) Look out for Buzzard display flights at this time of year- lots of 'peeow' calling and they also 'rollercoast' in flight-steep diving and climbing up again in the air, or two divebombing each other. This is usually an indication they will breed nearby.
 
Hey epickoala, I just found this book. It was nominated for a major literary prize in the U.S. From the description it looks like something you might be interested in as a parallel to what you are doing:

The Forest Unseen: A Year's Watch in Nature by David George Haskell (Viking)
A fascinating book that, for a year, closely follows the natural wonders occurring within a tiny patch of old-growth Tennessee forest.
 
DavidBrown said:
Hey epickoala, I just found this book. It was nominated for a major literary prize in the U.S. From the description it looks like something you might be interested in as a parallel to what you are doing:

The Forest Unseen: A Year's Watch in Nature by David George Haskell (Viking)
A fascinating book that, for a year, closely follows the natural wonders occurring within a tiny patch of old-growth Tennessee forest.
Click to expand...

Sounds interesting. Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out.
 
Pertinax said:
I guess Buzzards still aren't that common in Essex then? (they are in the South where I live- you can sometimes see up to half a dozen in the air at once!)

I would still guess they are breeding though- nature doesn't usually allow a 'vacuum' where non-breeders just stay in one place- they may not always be the same three birds!;) Look out for Buzzard display flights at this time of year- lots of 'peeow' calling and they also 'rollercoast' in flight-steep diving and climbing up again in the air, or two divebombing each other. This is usually an indication they will breed nearby.
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Pertinax they do all that and still I haven't seen a single chick I guess they are the same three birds as they are always in the same area, we do have a lot in Essex, there are a pair I often see up the road, and another pair at one of my other gardens, the three I mentioned are very puzzling, i assumed the lighter one was a youngster, but it's still there after about 4 years, and you sometimes get a close up as it sits on the fence posts from time to time, whilst the other two chase the jackdaws in there tree top nests.
By the way epickoala I heard the first cuckoo of the year today, and saw my first pair of swallows, also our first breeding pair of common toad- Bufo bufo- are in the garden pond, and hedgehogs are on the patio. it's amazing what a warm spell can bring out. keep a look out for those green woodpeckers!
 
dean said:
Pertinax they do all that and still I haven't seen a single chick I guess they are the same three birds as they are always in the same area, the three I mentioned are very puzzling, i assumed the lighter one was a youngster, but it's still there after about 4 years,
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Can only assume maybe its an infertile pair and accompanied perhaps by a non-breeding youg from a past year. Listen out for those (food-begging) wailing calls in late July/August- that's the proof either way if they are breeding or not.
 
I think you mmay wel be correct on the infertility track, I know one spot they nested in about 3 years ago but they didn't produce any young or even mess around the rather smallish nest.
The kestrels and occasionally sparrow hawks nest frequently and I hear the young squealing all day long.
i watched the buzzards again today soaring and dropping, they call continually rather like a keeping in touch call, even though they are rarely more than a few yards away from each other. I need to have my camera handy more often, of course when i do nothing of note happens.
 
dean said:
i watched the buzzards again today soaring and dropping, they call continually rather like a keeping in touch call, even though they are rarely more than a few yards away from each other.
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This is probably the noisiest time of year for the adults- during the courtship/territorial phases. I guess your non-breeders(?) go through the whole routine/cycle except there seems nothing to show for it.
 
I went to the Bullers'-o-Buchan on Saturday, one of the biggest sea bird colonies in the UK.
Unfortunately I was to late to see the Atlantic puffins. I did however see large colonies of Greater-black backed and herring gulls, Kittiwakes, and cormorants. The kittiwakes were a year-tick, and On the car journey home I got a life-tick in the form of a lapwing
 
I've been watching two Oystercatcher chicks hatched in the school yard over the last few weeks. I also saw a great crested grebe and chicks on Sunday
 
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