Ninety Minutes Sparrowhawk
Usually when a Sparrowhawk appears in the garden it is a quick fly-through that scatters all the feeding birds. The young male in this week’s photo did just that but then stood around in several places for more than ninety minutes. He was, of course, waiting for birds to return to the garden feeders but […]
Jack Snipe Challenge
There are now so many people taking digital photos of birds that whatever photo you take someone somewhere has got a better photo. You have now got to create your own challenge and keep at it until you have a decent shot. To find a Jack Snipe is never easy but to photograph one in […]
Top Stag
The Red Deer stag in this week’s blog stands proud in the Islay landscape. He has had a hectic time during the last few weeks and he can now rest, until next season that is. The fact he came to look at me may also mean that he now knows the season for shooting Red […]
Hunting Hen Harrier On Islay
If you see any photo of a hunting Hen Harrier with Jura in the background you are bound to be on Islay. We have just come back from our Autumn week on Islay which has been surprisingly mild but with a distinct lack of any sun. Unlike back home Islay has had a bumper crop […]
Hopwood Corvid Roost
.The spire of Hopwood Hall college is a well known site in north Manchester. The woodlands around the hall are good places for birds but what is not generally known is that the bird-watching gets even better as the sun sets.From miles around corvids (Jackdaws, Carrion Crows, Rooks and Magpies) fly in to roost in […]
Redwings Arrive
At dusk on the 2nd October I heard my first Redwing of Autumn but it took until the 19th before I found a flock of sixteen feeding on hawthorne berries. In complete contrast to last year there are very few Rowan or Hawthorne berries available to them this year so we are unlikely to see […]
Snipe Record
During the last ten days there has been a massive local passage of Snipe, helped no doubt by the many waterlogged fields. On the 10th in my local marsh I had a record count of seventy one Snipe and two Jack Snipe, they were the earliest I have recorded in more than fifty years! Click […]
The Arctic Flycatcher
The last time I saw a Grey Phalarope it was catching flies off the surface of a pool in Spitsbergen and was only 600 miles from the North Pole. Who would have thought that one of the most iconic of Arctic birds would turn up on a reservoir in Manchester and still be feeding on […]
Nightjars Return
On the 2nd August 1980 I came across a female Nightjar brooding two large young on Chat Moss. In those days it was the only place in Greater Manchester where Nightjars bred and soon after, through peat extraction, Nightjars ceased to breed in the County. During the thirty seven years since 1980 very few Nightjars […]
Heard The One About The Hedgehog?
During the last couple of months, when darkness falls over the garden and all the feeding birds have gone to roost, other visitors begin to appear. Hedgehogs have been coming to feed below the bird feeders and have taken readily to food put out specially for them. We have had a minimum of five different […]