Stormy Weather
A wild week on Islay, with snow in the Rest And Be Thankful on the way up. An otter was fishing off Jura as we sailed up the sound. Islay did not escape the severe weather in December and we have seen only one Stonechat and two Hen Harriers. There are no Snipe or Woodcock […]
On Tour
This week has been my annual film tour of South West Scotland. I drove two hundred and forty miles to Stranraer and decided to note how many raptors I saw en route. It proved conclusively how the Buzzard is now our commonest bird of prey and how the last three severe Winters have had a […]
Waxwings Still Around
It is good to know that around South Manchester there are still over five hundred Waxwings present in flocks of up to one hundred and sixty strong. Around Rochdale there are very few with one seen today on a drive to Hollingworth Lake. After mentioning last week that there were very few Jack Snipe around […]
Record Bullfinch Numbers
This weeks photo is one of the garden Jays taken during last months harsh weather. Its colours seem to stand out better in the snow, Not much birding done this week as I have had a very heavy film show schedule with two shows during the afternoon. However, the garden has again produced twenty species […]
Barn Owls Suffer
The BTO now inform us that following last months severe weather over one hundred Barn Owls have been recovered dead, twice the number that would have been expected in a normal period of snowy weather. These of course are ones that have been found so there will be many times that number still lying out […]
Garden Stars
This weeks photo is of one of the Fieldfares that were feeding on a single hawthorne bush at the rear of our garden last month. The garden has certainly starred this week with two Buzzards overhead on the 11th January, five Bullfinches on the 13th ( two females and three males) and eighteen Blue Tits […]
Death In The Snow
Newsletter December 2010
This year closes out in mild conditions but it will be remembered for its extremely low temperatures in January followed at the year end by the coldest December in more than a century – hard for the birds but excellent filming conditions. In January I visited Finland to film Golden Eagle in the snow. What […]
May The Force Be With You
Thornton Force that is, as seen in the photo taken from behind the waterfall with most of its falling water frozen. In the last eight days we have had seven nights when the temperature dropped to below minus 10°C. This has never happened in my life time before and with most days sunny and still […]
More Snow
The male Bullfinch in the snow was photographed in the garden this week. He was one of five different Bullfinches that have fed in the extreme conditions. We also had nine Blackbirds together one morning plus a Song Thrush, Nuthatch and Reed Bunting. On the nineteenth a Fox was at the back of the garden […]