Archived & Upcoming Images of the Day
A light twig for this rook flying up to his nest top right. This is alternate frames originally at about 5 fps, so this is about 2 seconds of flight.
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The 'even' numbered frames that would fit between the last 3 bird
images in the montage above.
They are separated out rather than overlapping the images or spreading them out.
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A Rook carrying his latest piece of 'timber' to reinforce the nest.
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A Barn owl makes a visit to the meadow post, gracing us with it's delicate plumage.
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"I'm sure this branch was upright when I landed on it"
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A Female Blackbird loads up on nest building material.
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Another sighting of a male Yellowhammer on the uncultivated strip to our South. Here he is foraging on what would seem to us to be a unpromising sea of waste tarmac used as turning area at the corner of the Farm Road.
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A rare visitor here, we last saw a Reed Bunting 3 years ago.
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2 Goldfinches making the most of the Black-Poplar Catkins. There were several Goldfinches coming and going in the trees.
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Down our access track at least 90 year old Black Poplars each year make their Catkins and drop a slippery carpet of them on the concrete below. Seen close-up they are very pretty. The leaves don't emerge for some weeks after the Catkins are finished.
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The Trail-cams record Badger visits most nights, but most of them are blurry messes of no more than 'its a Badger' interest. But here what must be different individuals visit the high quality photo sites, this one in the meadow ...
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A 'rough and tumble' on the mound, together with the ever hopeful interloper.
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This pair of Badgers seems to be having a wonderful rough-and-tumble on the slope of the mound.
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This Jackdaw on 'final approach" catches the evening sunlight in has black but shiny underwings.
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"I was Here" - Rook style.
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Several sightings this week of 3 Badgers together on the mound.
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We interpret this as a pair of Badgers 'getting in the mood' while a third was trying to inveigle itself into the party.
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Heron flies overhead.
We see far fewer Herons now that the Frogs and Newts have ceased visiting
the ponds to breed. Amphibians are having a terrible time
worldwide.
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Eyes of Herons sometimes appear almost unreal.
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An apparently very early sighting of a Holly Blue Butterfly in late March.
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The Holly Blue Butterfly seemed reluctant to open his wings so we could be sure of the sex, but finally HE did.
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These tiny white flowers are some sort of Chickweed.
The flowers are only about 5mm across (one fifth of an inch) - it is easy not
to even notice them.
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Primroses positively shine in the sunshine.
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This pretty flower is widely know as both Lady's Smock (Cuckoo Flower) and Cuckoo Flower. This is our first sighting this year - over the next few weeks we expect masses of these flowers in and around the main pond.
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High in this tree this female Chaffinch looks quite atypical when you can't see the wing pattern on her flanks.
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A female Chaffinch looking really sweet in the lichen.
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A Tawny Owl makes a swooping landing to settle on the perch.
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A detail shows the top edge of the wing with soft feathers to cut down wind noise. Owls are famed for their Silent Flight.
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A few minutes on the Meadow post for the Tawny Owl.
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The lower Rook had made 2 quiet passes to the nest we see on the left to steal nesting material for his own. The third pass was rudely interrupted by the arrival of the rightful owner (flying right to left at nest height) while the thief made a hasty exit downwards complete with his booty.
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A pair of Rooks continuing their irregular courtship feeds.
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"Bring me back some soft bedding from the furniture shop ..."
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"... and pop into the timber merchants for some wood."
"Yes dear"
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This Yellowhammer is on a disused concrete track.
We love that slightly quirky but powerful beak.
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A Tree Sparrow decorating, or being decorated by, Blossom.
A study in Brown and white
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A Wren outside the living room.
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This Dunnock was fluttering her (?) wings in the top of the hedge, and we expected a male to visit and courtship feed her. But he didn't.
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A midday walk found this 'end' of a Grey Squirrel tail lying in the middle of our concrete access track. The centre of the tail break shows slightly bloody break. We didn't give much chance of the Squirrel having survived the encounter, but next afternoon the woodland camera caught this tail-tip-less Squirrel apparently not a great deal worse for wear. A couple of other sightings ensued.
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'Biting off more than 'he' can chew?'
This is a Grey Squirrel - they don't know when to give up!
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An unexpected sighting of a truly 'blonde' male Pheasant. Not mature enough to be the one that became the dominant bird a few years ago, this may be his son. This has been our only sighting so far.
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This Reeve's Muntjac Deer Fawn was first spotted through the window at a stepping stone path near the garage. The creatures tiny hooves are hidden below the level of the slab nearer the camera. You can see a trace of the 'Bambi' markings.
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The photographer quietly stepping outside and with the Fawn moving into the sunlight, bagged some clearer pics. It didn't seem to notice the photographer at all, but something further up the orchard path disturbed the little creature and it leapt away out of sight.
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The 3rd frame from the above montage in much more detail.
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A Rook arrives at the meadow post with a beakful of 'something' for the nest.
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Huge Beak, tiny berry!
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A male Chaffinch with almost perfect blue coating on his beak. You can see the edge of the coating top and bottom near the tip of the beak.
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We haven't found the Wren's nest yet, but there is obviously one somewhere at the north side of the house. This through the North facing living room window as the Wren collects soft moss to build the nest.
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A Robin singing his little heart out is framed by Cherry Blossom.
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We capture just the one frame of this Tawny Owl just a few centimetres above the perch outside the kitchen window, arriving 2 hours after midnight.
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A more 'compact' view of the landing Tawny Owl with a good view of the muddy feet.
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Norway Spruce is what is known as a 'Christmas Tree' in the UK. Planted soon after we arrived it now produces masses of fir cones we collect up and put out for the animals.
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Grey Squirrels enjoy the seed cones from Norway Spruce, often taking them away to somewhere convenient.
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Here a Grey Squirrel has chosen the protecting slate on top of one of our outside camera boxes to rip to shreds a Norway Spruce fir cone to eat the seeds. This seems to have been a particularly thorough destruction.
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Rooks Courtship feeding at the nest. The gales have so far failed to dislodge any of the very exposed nests.
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In late morning the sun now reaches a decent height, so the centre of the rainbow is well below the horizon. The rainbow is caught as two adjoining frames, with the bird added at a different focal length from two frames later. But the kite was flying over the bow as you see here.
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The Tawny owl about to land on the meadow post. It looks a bit like a bad landing and the bird may have gone round to try again before the camera flash could re-charge.
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Do you like our Owl? (Quote from the movie 'Blade
Runner')
But there is nothing 'artificial' about ours!
As far as we can see this was an unbroken stay of 54 minutes.
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We expected the gales to bring down one or more Rook's nests, but they have so far all survived. But inside the woodland this at least year old Squirrel Drey hit the ground remarkably intact. It was bigger than we had imagined - see size 8 UK shoe for scale. Turning it over reveals a lovely soft and snug lining.
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One of our many Grey squirrel looking longingly at the kitchen window - perhaps trying to 'will us' out with some food.
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One of the characteristics of Ash trees is the clumps of seeds they produce, taking the name 'Keys' (so called because they look like old fashioned keys hanging in a bunch on a wire ring). The seeds have a single wing and spin as they fall, also giving them the name 'Spinners'
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Cherry Blossom in Japan may be fantastic, but we think the UK blossom is beautiful in a quieter way.
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A Rook stops off on the phone cable lit by the orange rising sun.
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Grubs Up! This Rook gets early access to the freshly baited tree-stump.
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On this day a gale is blowing and there is hardly a bird to be seen - they
have found sheltered spots where they can wait for the wind to abate.
This Rook on the ground by the hedge is atypical - if they are on the
ground you expect them to be actively feeding rather than sitting out a storm.
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At our northern boundary this male Reeve's Muntjac Deer (right) was between the outer and inner hedges, looking at us with suspicion. He seemed to move left through the hedge and on the other side we saw a Deer again (left). Only later did we discover that this was the female so we assume that they must have been wandering over the site together.
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From inside the kitchen we watched this male Reeves Muntjac Deer quietly feeding on the grass at the pond edge.
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What's up there then?
We couldn't see anything above the robin in the original camera frame.
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The Robins now move towards us as we walk about - normally at most 4 at a time when we are at one of their territorial boundaries.
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