Nature Notes: May 2015
I couldn't wash my face
in the morning dew on the first of May as there was a rather hard
frost. Although I felt this was rather unseasonal it was not the last
of the month.
There was quite a lot of firsts
this month:
The first sound of the
cuckoo (Cuculus canorus), the first drumming of the great
spotted woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) and the first swallow
(Hirundo rustica), all of which were on the 9th.
The breeding season
brought fourth its results on the 13th in the shape of a
young blackbird (Turdus merula); the first juvenile of the
year.
We had to wait until
the 23rd before the starlings(Sturnus
vulgaris)
introduced us to their new broods.
Two families of turned up with
three young each. The parents were pecking off mouthfuls of suet
block (the birds are eating one a day now, with a little help from a
squirrel) and feeding them to their squabbling young.
With all this activity
around the feeders it is becoming more common to see a sparrowhawk
swooping in to come to grips with some fledgling prey. When the alarm
call goes up the birds scatter to the safety of the bushes. However,
the sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) can be seen plunging into
the bush to grab a bird from the supposed safe cover of it's conifer
shelter.
The birds are not the
only creatures who have been procreating this spring as we have some
unwelcome visitors in the shape of three rats (Rattus norvegicus)
. Three rats in the daylight probably means many more under the cover
of night. That's life.
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| This sparrow kept looking through the window |
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| A female eider duck with ducklings on the Firth of Forth |
