Nature notes; March 2015

Nature Notes: March 2015 

Birds

Snippets of interest:

A jay (Garrulus glandarius) on the Roman Road.

A kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) on the conker tree.

A crow (Corvus corone) chasing a barn owl (Tyto alba) on the Roman Road.

Two yellowhammers (Emberiza citrinella) in an oil seed rape field near B.

Yellowhammer 

Up to four buzzards (Buteo buteo) near B woods.

A sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) on the bird table and one wet evening it kept coming back to perch on the pergola above the feeders.

A kingfisher (Alcedo atthis) was spotted twice in the ditches near the second wood on the Roman Road at 16:45 on the 12th. I watched the blue flash of rump fly up the ditch when I was on my way down and again on my way back.

Two pied wagtails (Motacilla alba) fighting on the roof of the garage.

A one eyed great tit on the bird table.

 

A great tit but a poor eye

Mammals

I saw five deer (Capreolus capreolus) and two hares (Lepus europaeus) on the 6th when I was walking on the Roman Road.

The oddest site I saw was on the Saturday afternoon of the 7th I met a fox hunt coming up the Roman Road. There was perhaps two or three men in red coats riding the boundaries of the fields with a pack of dogs but they looked like they were out of luck trying to raise any foxes. The main body of the hunt were composed of 20 to 30 riders all plodding along chatting dressed like gentry in their best fox hunting costumes. A very odd pastime.

October nature notes

Birds

The  great spotted woodpeckers (Dendrocopos major) have started to return to the garden. Both males and females have been seen feeding on the suet.
Goldfinches (Carduelis carduelis) are on the increase with up to four on the Niger seeds at one time. However I did spot ten of them on a telephone wire near B.

A tawny owl (Strix aluco) can sometimes be heard during the night calling from the chestnut tree.
On the down side there was a dead barn owl (Tyto alba) on the road verge between Buckles Inn and Bilbrough services.

Bird on a wire..........

Mammals

We still have evidence of hedgehogs (Erinaceous europaeus) in the back garden. Judging by the amount of droppings there must be quite a few or at least one very incontinent one.

 There was only one sighting of a stoat (Mustela erminea) in the garden this month, although I did see one on the way to work. That is I was on the way to work not the stoat.
There was a dead badger (Meles meles) on the A64 near the race course.

Insects

Fox moth caterpillar in Scotland at Yellow Craig. Time to hibernate.