On some mornings a short stop at Sea Walls then at the Peregrine Watch has little to see, on other mornings there is a lot of activity. Tuesday and Wednesday contrasted like this. The Redshank were all lined up at the water edge on Tuesday, today they were all over the mud and I saw several flying, while a group of them bunched up at the water edge. In flight these are very elegant little birds, they fly low over the water, and the white edges to their wings, seen from above on the cliff, are attractive. Likewise the Kestrel. He was flying, rather gliding, around below the Peregrine Watch, obviously hunting. I followed him with glasses for a good five minutes until my arms tired; he skimmed the trees, landed on one, came down into a bush, then rose and hovered. The last I saw of him was high above the river towards the Suspension Bridge.
Three Cormorants flew singly downriver, another up river. Two Great Black Backed Gulls were down on the mud below, very interested in something at the water edge, they kept a Lesser Black Backed Gull and some other Gulls away from whatever interested them. In the Jackdaw Tree one bird had its mate pinned into a crook of the branches and was busy with its beak among the mate's head feathers. I'm not sure that the mate was too keen on this delousing! A flight of small birds passed, very small and with flashes of yellow, their flight was up-and-down, and they disappeared off towards the Gully. The bouncy flight shows they were probably Golfinches.
I did not see the Ravens, but may have had fleeting glimpse of a Peregrine, movement in the oaks opposite turned out to be a Grey Squirrel.
At the beginning of Circular Road, and to the right are some large trees with nests in them (5?), at one point I thought these were Rook nests, but on closer examination they seem to have Crows in them. Crows Nests!
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
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