Wild Wanderings

Sunday 14th January 2018

Reflection and 'Blackhawk'

What a miserable drab week it has been weather wise this week. I only managed a solitary walk to the river. I sat there for about an hour or so in the vane hope that something would happen but alas no joy. There were a few Canada Geese and a Cormorant visible in the quarry. But even they were quiet. The river and quarry were very still so I took a couple of shots of the reflections and trudged my way home. Its always nice down by the river but that day it was very cold. When I turned to take a final look, a Merganser did a solitary fly past, but I was to far off to capture a shot.

Today (Sunday) I decided to sit in the paddock. I took my camera, but the light was still very poor. I don’t like pushing the ISO (sensitivity) of the camera to far as I am never satisfied with the results. I took it purely ‘just in case’.

The wheat field was host to about 50 Fieldfare, but they soon scattered on my arrival. As did the Crows and pigeons. I took up my usual place and just waited about twenty minutes and the small birds started to return. Blue Tits, Sparrows, Greenfinch and Goldfinch all made an appearance. The star of the day was a male Blackbird who came in in squawking his familiar alarm call. All the birds scattered, and he promptly started to scrap around for seeds and worms. He did this a couple of times and his tactics always worked. I got a couple of shots of him but not as good as I hoped for, the light was still poor. But it struck me he sort of looked like a little Sparrowhawk, he even had a barred and specked breast. I think he had been taken lessons from the local hawks. What’s more I think he may have thought he was a SH so I’ve nicknamed him ‘Blackhawk’. I’ll watch out for him in the future.

Grey Squirrel made an appearance and cleared away the remains of any food there was around, and the light was fading fast. About 3-45pm I made my way back home.

Looking forward to spring.

‘till tomorrow