The Bird Thread

Walked along Dollis Brook, from West Finchley back into Hampstead, on Monday. Surprised to see an egret at the weir under the A1.

The great tits nesting in the bird box left the nest this morning when I was tinkering with bike! Fascinating to watch.

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Got all excited to say I saw my first ever Grey Wagtail today, though you have a far superior photo compared to my Monet-esque digital zoom attempt. Saw it flash under the bridge I was on and thought "Kingfisher? No, wait, that was yellow!?" Looked over the other side and it circled back to land on a mud flat on the bend of the river.

Do you know was it a Grey Wagtail or a Yellow Wagtail? The picture you are replying to is a Grey Wagtail (yellow with grey upper body and often found by water) and this is one I took yesterday which is my first Yellow Wagtail (unless Adroit or Colin come along and tell me otherwise), was one of four in a field next to a sewage work along with a lot of Pied Wagtails and my first White Wagtail, wagtails love sewage works if you are ever passing one

As well as the Wag's, had a good mixed bunch the last couple of days, lot Blackcaps, Chiff chaffs and Willow Warbler heard but getting to the time of year where leaves making it hard to see things
Wren going full throttle

Great Crested Grebe, really hoping to see one carrying young soon

Reed Bunting

Always happy to see a Greenfinch

Return of the Tern, Common Tern

Me tomorrow trying to wake my teen up that Easter holidays are over

As you know perfectly well, that is indeed a yellow wagtail, I am ludicrously flattered to be thought of as someone who has any idea. I always think of terns as gulls interbred with fairies.

Do you know was it a Grey Wagtail or a Yellow Wagtail?

It was a grey - grey upper but a very luminous yellow bottom half, wether that was the sunlight and contrast with the mud or a mating season boost of colour I don't know. I think it was catching the first of the mayfly in swift darts out across the water then back to the flat to potter about.

White Wagtail

That's a new one on me!

Same thing as a pied wagtail, some varieties have more white.

Yeah went down a small diversion this morning of all the different types of pied/white!

Nice way of describing terns. There are fairy terns too.

Yeh someone said they had seen a citrine wagtail near me the other day that sent me down a rabbit hole of all the different variations you can get

Lots of warbler fun out there. Chiffchaff at lunchtime, and can you guess what sort of warbler is in the other pic?

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Tricky! Sedge?

Here’s a sedge. The previous one is a grasshopper, the first I have ever heard.

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Fleeting glimpse in the scrub

Nice Bull.

Such amazing birds.
They unfortunately seem to be high in the list of fodder for our local peregrine pair. At the moment it’s mostly pigeons but once the young appear bullfinch remains feature heavily beneath the nest!

Guess they are easy to spot but am surprised as I really struggle to see them as they vanish so quickly into the trees once they catch sight of you. I went to an amazing place on Sunday which is an old mine workings being left to go back to nature and they had great feeders there which the bull finches were visiting and they were easily the most skittish of the birds visiting the feeders, they spent ages working there way in to the open and checking it all out each time

Lovely

Black necked Grebe which was the reason for visiting the old mine pits, overheard someone saying it was there and had never heard of the place despite it being only 25minutes away, was much better than many reserves I have been to despite dogs in the pits, yoofs getting high in the reeds and general bored teens skulking around but the wildlife didn't seem to care

Great shot - not often you see them in their fantastic breeding plumage over here.

Fuck shooting estates
https://twitter.com/RaptorPersScot/status/1519130643493441537

Still don't get why you'd do this but not ban cars if you want to protect your pheasants and partridge (so they can be shot in a few months instead). Must be an inefficient way of protecting the birds (that you want to be killed) and scope for a lot of accidential poisoning of other animals.

Do white tailed eagles eat carrion/scavenge? If they do then they probably aren't hunting (m)any pheasants when so many are killed on the roads every day. See plenty of other birds taking advantage of a free meal at the side of the road (WTE's not spotted in my area yet sadly).

Saw my first swallow of the year this morning