The Bird Thread

^nice to get to that point in the year. Swifts next?

Larking about this morning

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Skylarks, Lapwings, Curlew & Grouse a plenty but no pics of them. Sadly found a dead Wren I think on the Longdendale trail, and this egg near Hebden Bridge

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Visited Rye Meads today. 3 kingfishers isn't too bad I guess. Pictures are about the best I can do on a dull day with a slow 200mm

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Rolled round a loop towards Eton & Windsor.
In the first section in South Bucks,
I saw five separate pairs of Goldfinches!

Stopped at a heronry yesterday which was cool and very noisy! Probably been better a few weeks ago before all the leaves came out, obscured a lot

Saw a swallow on my ride yesterday, first of the year. Also a ton of lapwings out and about doing their crazy flying and weird beep booping call.

Saw a swallow in Norfolk the weekend, and so so many raptors. Sparrowhawk's aplenty and some I couldn't identify (ignorance as well as distance)
And came back to Essex to find a headless starling on my patio (no carrion eaters other than ants and flies)

lapwings…weird beep booping call

On this, I hadn’t heard a lapwing until about two weeks ago. First heard it on a night ride, emanating from a pitch black field. I honestly thought it was someone doing metal detectoring or something. It was only when I heard the same sound about two miles onwards that I figured it had to either be a bird. Or aliens.

The one that got away...

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Just caught the goldfinches ripping my senecio plant to shreds. I assume it's for some cosy soft nesting.

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Today was a good day, sat in a layby watching ospreys on a nest coming and going with a white throat sat on a wire overheard providing the sound track

Went down to the Thames at Bourne End, black headed gulls and common terns going nuts for all the flying insects. Also grebes, herons, cormorants but didn't get any decent pics of those

Lots of Wilson's warblers rummaging around in the bushes today.

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A swift last night, first of the year for me

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No photos but just had a peregrine falcon doing the classic 'drop like a stone' attack on something above my garden. Probably one of the ones that nests at the cathedral in the city. Top level garden tick!

Nice. And great work getting a shot of the nippy little bastards, still never managed that myself.

Couple of cuckoos out this morning on my ride. Didn’t see them, of course, but nice to hear them out and about. Otherwise it was lapwings, meadow pipits, skylarks and a pied wagtail. Oh and a dead blackbird.

Pair o' cocks

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So many birds out today.

• Yellow-headed blackbird
  
• Tree swallows
  
• Osprey
  
• Marsh wren
  

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Great photos, those first two birds are really pretty

Stopped off at RSPB Leighton Moss yesterday to break up a long drive. Never been an RSPB member as not that many reserves around me but made a bit more use lately when travelling, so was convinced to join by the member staff. After I signed up, he told us I was his 2,000th member he had signed up and some other staff came out to congratulate him, was quite a nice moment. He said he had started volunteering for them at 14, so guess that was at least 50+, if not 60 years of work being marked.

https://youtu.be/c5qtu_ZsQqw

Just heard the swifts fly over Peckham

Couple of little dudes knocking on my front door (forgive crappy camera phone photo)

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It's been scientifically proven that goldfinches are more beautiful than Scarlet Jo doodah.