Snowdrops Flourish
We are now home after another week on Islay with brilliant frosty, sunny weather and one day with another four inches of snow – just what the doctor ordered. This weeks photos show the woods at Bridgend covered in snowdrops that have withstood days of minus 4º and four inches of snow. The Little Egret […]
An Islay Winter
We have just spent a week on our favourite Hebridean island of Islay with incredible Winter weather and four inches of snow on one day. It was an unique experience to walk around the lochs and woodlands with everywhere covered in deep snow and coated in frost There have been good sightings of Hen Harriers, […]
Who Killed Cock Robin?
Yes this male Sparrow Hawk had his second Robin of the Winter in the garden this week. I know he has to live but I wish he would go somewhere else! Last week I have been on my annual film show tour of South West Scotland with the best weather I have ever had for […]
Signs of Spring
Severe frost early in the week but now somewhat milder as I made a first visit to some of the moorland plantations. In one a single Long Eared Owl was found but only thirty foot away from it a pair were together and apparently ready for the breeding season ahead. Whilst there are still Jack […]
Survival Time For Herons
There is still no let up in the severe weather with keen frosts on most nights this week and I wonder how many Herons will be left to breed next month when the season starts. With the continued Winter weather both Woodcock and Jack Snipe are still around trying to find somewhere to feed that […]
Golden Eagles And Hypothermia
I have just returned from four days in Finland filming a pair of Golden Eagles that were feeding at a baited site in the forest. When I flew into Helsinki the temperature was minus 16°C and it went much, much colder. When I entered the hide at 7.30am the following morning the temperature registered a […]
Jack Snipe Star of The Big Freeze
This week’s photo is one of the five Jack Snipe in a local ditch that have gathered all this week. Renown for being difficult to locate two to five birds have fed all week in the ditch and now with the snow rapidly clearing, the Jack Snipe have gone with it! On Hopwood Buzzards are […]
New Garden Birds
What a week of severe weather with record low temperatures and a foot of snow on one day During the extreme conditions a Moorhen appeared in the garden feeding with the thrushes and then today, the 9th, a Fieldfare started to feed on the apples and chase off all the Blackbirds. It was pleasing to […]
Snow, Snow And More Snow
This week’s photo, taken through the video camera, is of a Water Rail on the ice at Elton reservoir – a fitting climax to my best ever season in thirty nine years of filming wildlife. On the same day I also had great views of two Kingfishers that desperately tried to find somewhere that was […]
Winter Wonders
On the nineteenth of December I had the best local day ever for two species of wader with four Jack Snipe together in the Thornham fields and an amazing ten different Woodcock in Hopwood woods including five together! Following the nineteenth we had snow, in fact ten inches fell in four days followed by minus […]