Britain's best birds.

[sufi]

1 swift i have seen, very high, could have been a swallow

whoa my best ever unintentional haiku, wish uncle luka was here

 

[IdleRich]

I wish - I've only seen the picture in the news article which I have shamelessly lifted from their site and posted here. Even if I had seen one and taken a photo it would be a blurry, out of focus mess...

I understood it wasn't your pic but I thought maybe you had seen it. I've been to a few places where they've said "Oh you're lucky, we have a rare migratory X passing through at the moment" but really you have fuck all chance of seeing it nine times out of ten.
Well that's been my experience mainly. We did have one holiday where it kinda all came together to make up for a lifetime of birding disappointments. We were in the Hebrides and there a gyrfalcon there that had been blown off course and we saw something that must have been it. Also there was a golden Eagle which was an infrequent visitor but not as unique to spot. We were driving down a super narrow windy lane through fields and dad saw this huge bird just sitting in the field, stopped the car to look at it. The car behind us was a load or builders or roofers or whatever and the comes up and says what the fuck you doing? When we said we thought it was a golden Eagle the whole load of them piled out the van with binoculars and were more enthusiastic than we were i think.
Also that trip we saw a corncrake which pretty much only nests on Coll and on the way home we saw an osprey for the first time - though since then I have seen a few in Portugal.

 

[william_kent]

I understood it wasn't your pic but I thought maybe you had seen it. I've been to a few places where they've said "Oh you're lucky, we have a rare migratory X passing through at the moment" but really you have fuck all chance of seeing it nine times out of ten.
Well that's been my experience mainly. We did have one holiday where it kinda all came together to make up for a lifetime of birding disappointments. We were in the Hebrides and there a gyrfalcon there that had been blown off course and we saw something that must have been it. Also there was a golden Eagle which was an infrequent visitor but not as unique to spot. We were driving down a super narrow windy lane through fields and dad saw this huge bird just sitting in the field, stopped the car to look at it. The car behind us was a load or builders or roofers or whatever and the comes up and says what the fuck you doing? When we said we thought it was a golden Eagle the whole load of them piled out the van with binoculars and were more enthusiastic than we were i think.
Also that trip we saw a corncrake which pretty much only nests on Coll and on the way home we saw an osprey for the first time - though since then I have seen a few in Portugal.

I'm nowhere near Norfolk, so zero chance of me seeing the white tailed eagle... the best we get in Manchester is a chance of spotting the peregrines which sometimes nest on top of tall buildings in the city centre - they've nested on top of the CIS building ( home to what was known as the Co-op bank HQ before the Crystal Methodist debacle, and rumoured to be the entrance to an underground city / nuclear bunker ) and last year they were spotted on the Town Hall



here's one flying by the Cathedral, probably when they were on the co-op bank building ( it's only a few hundred feet away )



again I've stolen the images...but I can claim to have seen a fuzzy shape above the CIS building that I maintain was a peregrine

 

[IdleRich]

Amazing birds

 

[jenks]

I'm nowhere near Norfolk, so zero chance of me seeing the white tailed eagle... the best we get in Manchester is a chance of spotting the peregrines which sometimes nest on top of tall buildings in the city centre - they've nested on top of the CIS building ( home to what was known as the Co-op bank HQ before the Crystal Methodist debacle, and rumoured to be the entrance to an underground city / nuclear bunker ) and last year they were spotted on the Town Hall

View attachment 7208

here's one flying by the Cathedral, probably when they were on the co-op bank building ( it's only a few hundred feet away )

View attachment 7209

again I've stolen the images...but I can claim to have seen a fuzzy shape above the CIS building that I maintain was a peregrine

I’m lucky enough to cycle near the Blackwater where J A Baker lived and wrote The Peregrine - mostly I just see remnants of their kills in the roadside but every so often I catch sight of one and it absolutely makes my day.
My favourite sight recently was watching two crows taking in a buzzard who was clearly too much interest in a nest. Proper mid air scrap. The buzzard eventually retreated.

 

[jenks]

And as @luka isnt here I can post this - regularly cycle along this path but yet to see the Peregrine he talks about

 

[Murphy]

The humble robin and hedge-sparrows

Pigeon proofed a bird feeder (place a meshed dome over the top) and these little creatures are loving it. My youngest son is obsessed mow too

 

[william_kent]

What's wrong with this picture?

The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has promised to review current posters that show female birds in smaller pictures compared to their male counterparts.

RSPB vows to review ‘sexist’ posters showing female birds as smaller than males

 

[william_kent]

Red kite attacks: why birds of prey are causing havoc on the streets of Henley

Only recently, a child in a pram suffered nasty cuts after a kite snatched a custard cream from his hand.

 

[IdleRich]

Loved it when they were reintroduced, such big and impressive birds. Pretty wimpy though I believe relative to their size, should be easy enough to fight one off.

 

[IdleRich]

have you guys noticed that the birds are disappearing?

Definitely when I went to Orkney last year I really did seea huge change in the nu.ber of birds we saw. Now I've been to the Orkneys three or four times in my life, each time separated by a number of years if not decades and for that reason there has never been a gradual decline be that is hard to spot, this time there were simply fewer birds o see from fewer species and the change was really marked... it was really depressing, no other word forit.

 

[IdleRich]

I see kestrels a lot when I’m out on my bike - there is something utterly magical about them that immediately cheers me up. I’ve been lucky to see owls, peregrines, buzzards and kites on various rides and each time it feels like a gift.

Kestrels and harriers are among the very few that hover like that, hence the plane called harrier I guess. Dunno about the beer though, maybe it makes you think you can hover if you sink a few.

 

[IdleRich]

1 swift i have seen, very high, could have been a swallow

Did you know swifts and swallows are not closely related? Basically they evolved in parallel and came up with essentially the same solution to the same problem hence their similar appearance in terms of shape.

Apologies if I said that previously which I no doubt did, it being the only thing I know about them.

 

[IdleRich]

I’m lucky enough to cycle near the Blackwater where J A Baker lived and wrote The Peregrine - mostly I just see remnants of their kills in the roadside but every so often I catch sight of one and it absolutely makes my day.
My favourite sight recently was watching two crows taking in a buzzard who was clearly too much interest in a nest. Proper mid air scrap. The buzzard eventually retreated.

Not read that book but I have heard that it is really something quite special.... in fact the two separate people who told me about it resorted to language that was so dramatic and powerful it left me wondering what he says in the book itself.

Re crows chasing off buzzards, that's something I find interesting too. And in the same way, should the situation arise, I think birds such as buzzards join together in the same way to gang up on even bigger birds such as eagles.

 

[IdleRich]

Definitely when I went to Orkney last year I really did seea huge change in the nu.ber of birds we saw. Now I've been to the Orkneys three or four times in my life, each time separated by a number of years if not decades and for that reason there has arsehole been a gradual decline be that is hard to spot, this time there were simply fewer birds o see from fewer species and the change was really marked... it was really depressing, no other word forit.

You know how you see smug arseholes talking bollocks on some subject and you just know they're wrong and you kinda look forward to the inevitable moment when they find out the hard way. I guess a good example would be hard-core Christians who tell everyone that they are going to hell. I'd like them to have a few seconds after death to appreciate that they wasted their life talking bollocks. I'm sure there are better examples that don't require someone dying first too.

Anyway, another such group are those who keep going on about how climate change is a hoax and so on. Those people really are insufferable; they are rude, they are stupid and they are bullies, plus they've somehow created a world in which a few lonely twitchers and disorganised crusties are big money while gigantic multinationals such as Shell or BP are the little guys bravely fighting back against the all-powerful army of tweedy academics and a few people who enjoy watching animals.

Well theses people are dreadful, they're evil, they lie and they happily take money to destroy the world we all live in.... and yet, if by some miraculous twist of fate, some miscalculation or magical change they turn out to be right then of course they will be utterly unbearable, some of the worst people in the world will get even worse and hey will never ever shut up about it and the whole thing will be completely hideous - and yet, and yet.... I hope that somehow against all the odds some miracle happens and climate change vanishes and the evil cunts turn out to be right. I will happily swallow my pride and be really pleased that every single scientist ever and all those of us who believed them turned out to be wrong. For the first time ever I hope to be a fool and I hope the cunts win. Somehow though, I don't quite see it sadly.

 

[jenks]

Not read that book but I have heard that it is really something quite special.... in fact the two separate people who told me about it resorted to language that was so dramatic and powerful it left me wondering what he says in the book itself.

Re crows chasing off buzzards, that's something I find interesting too. And in the same way, should the situation arise, I think birds such as buzzards join together in the same way to gang up on even bigger birds such as eagles.

I don't know about that but i remember reading that some birds will form a mob and shit on a predator - i think it might affect the big birds ability to fly or something - i think it was on an Attenborough programme - field fairs maybe? Craner would know.

 

[DLaurent]

I'm useless at birds. See loads where I live. But all I like is the Blackbirds and their call. Birdee birdee.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

Did you know swifts and swallows are not closely related? Basically they evolved in parallel and came up with essentially the same solution to the same problem hence their similar appearance in terms of shape.

Apologies if I said that previously which I no doubt did, it being the only thing I know about them.

It's funny that their names evolved convergently too.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

You know how you see smug arseholes talking bollocks on some subject and you just know they're wrong and you kinda look forward to the inevitable moment when they find out the hard way. I guess a good example would be hard-core Christians who tell everyone that they are going to hell. I'd like them to have a few seconds after death to appreciate that they wasted their life talking bollocks. I'm sure there are better examples that don't require someone dying first too.

Anyway, another such group are those who keep going on about how climate change is a hoax and so on. Those people really are insufferable; they are rude, they are stupid and they are bullies, plus they've somehow created a world in which a few lonely twitchers and disorganised crusties are big money while gigantic multinationals such as Shell or BP are the little guys bravely fighting back against the all-powerful army of tweedy academics and a few people who enjoy watching animals.

Well theses people are dreadful, they're evil, they lie and they happily take money to destroy the world we all live in.... and yet, if by some miraculous twist of fate, some miscalculation or magical change they turn out to be right then of course they will be utterly unbearable, some of the worst people in the world will get even worse and hey will never ever shut up about it and the whole thing will be completely hideous - and yet, and yet.... I hope that somehow against all the odds some miracle happens and climate change vanishes and the evil cunts turn out to be right. I will happily swallow my pride and be really pleased that every single scientist ever and all those of us who believed them turned out to be wrong. For the first time ever I hope to be a fool and I hope the cunts win. Somehow though, I don't quite see it sadly.

Tell us when the first 5-year climate ultimatum was posted. Are you currently on fire?

Hide the decline! Hide the decline!

 

[mixed_biscuits]

I guess a good example would be hard-core Christians who tell everyone that they are going to hell. I'd like them to have a few seconds after death to appreciate that they wasted their life talking bollocks. I'm sure there are better examples that don't require someone dying first too.

What probability are you assigning to hell? It must be zero because any probability x eternal damnation gives you quite a low expected value. How can you justify a zero percent expectation of hell?

5-10 % of near death experiences are of hell.