Birdwatching 2026

Subject: RE: BS: Birdwatching 2024
From: The Sandman
Date: 13 Jun 26 - 03:47 PM

Just seen a Black cap

Subject: RE: BS: Birdwatching 2024
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 14 Jun 26 - 06:17 AM

Perhaps we need a 2026 thread?

We have a little owl that seems to be out hunting in the mornings.

Robin

Done. -Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Birdwatching 2024
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Jun 26 - 09:08 AM

Hello and goodbye to the last day of Spring.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 17 Jun 26 - 06:52 PM

Lovely sight near the mouth of the River Esk at Musselburgh: large collection of Eider ducklings with several Mama ducks: the males seemed to be further out in the estuary. But there is a weir, and one wee duckling had gone over it, with one of the Mamas keeping a close eye, but sadly no chance of the tiny bird getting back up the weir, despite valiant efforts trying.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 18 Jun 26 - 05:33 PM

We still have the curlews around. I don't think of it as summer until they head off for the coast.

Robin

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 24 Jun 26 - 05:22 AM

A lot of squawking going on over a friend’s house in West Lothian yesterday: a buzzard being mobbed by two crows!

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 24 Jun 26 - 08:40 AM

I'll raise you a buzzard being mobbed by a raven and then a kestrel!

Robin

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Nick Dow
Date: 24 Jun 26 - 10:06 AM

Here out on the Boulsworth moors, I have had a Woodpecker, a Dunnock and amazingly a Hen Harrier landed in our garden with its prey.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jun 26 - 10:13 AM

Not sure what it was, possibly a blue jay, seems to have exploded into a small clumps of feathers on the side of my house. I suspect one of the local redtail hawks was moving fast when it caught it.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Jun 26 - 11:03 AM

I was paddling up a tidal creek looking at an osprey nest with nestlings peeking out when a bald eagle appeared over the tree line and started lighting into the nest, all of a sudden he reversed gears and took off while a pair of adult ospreys, approaching from different directions, swooped after him.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 25 Jun 26 - 05:54 AM

Sitting in the garden yesterday, I switched my Merlin app on: it identified the following, though I confess I didn’t see all of them:
House sparrow, bluetit, goldfinch, blackbird, wood pigeon, Siskin and house martin.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Nick Dow
Date: 25 Jun 26 - 07:16 AM

House Martins! Lovely. Closest we get here is Swifts. We have well-fed wood pigeons. They fly down and swipe the food off our chickens. The hens don't mind, but beware any crows that come near.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 25 Jun 26 - 07:26 AM

I did see the house martin, flying out from under the eaves of a neighbour’s roof. You are lucky to see swifts!

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Nick Dow
Date: 25 Jun 26 - 09:59 AM

A whole flock feed over the beck bottom on the moor. I usually walk the dog there. We have owls in the woods opposite the stream by our cottage. Pheasants seem rarer than a couple of years ago. We had two tame ones who came to the back door and begged for food. It seems that the local shoot has stopped that, though.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Jun 26 - 10:44 AM

Driving through the neighborhood yesterday I passed a turkey vulture on a lawn dining on a roadkill red squirrel. They're a good cleanup crew.

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: Nick Dow
Date: 26 Jun 26 - 03:50 AM

Roadkill! That's how I learned to skin a rabbit. I was at a Gypsy camp and ate it with potatoes and crusty bread. No complaints! Not sure the rabbit was too pleased. Meanwhile, we appear to have a psychotic robin (no offence to caterpillar wrestlers) who has marked out most of our garden as his territory. We have fighting birds! Like being back in South London!

Subject: RE: Birdwatching 2026
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 29 Jun 26 - 10:19 AM

We have had a series of robins in our back garden (in West Oxfordshire), a regular dynasty; I remember one or other of them taunting our late cat. This spring, I saw two male robins having discussions in the side garden, but we haven't seen either of them for Simply Ages.

Having a robin around seems to make a garden, the way a cat completes a home. We'll have to make do with the pair of blackbirds which appear, in said cat's absence, to have set up nest in our clematis.