Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Although it was just an innocent reference to something non-birding that had happened on the patch (to try and keep the interest going and put the place in some kind of context, yeah?), the statcounter showed that a fair few people wanted to see pictures of the accident on Wandsworth Bridge yesterday, and unfortunately for them they landed on this here blog. It amused me somewhat that they had arrived looking for pictures of carnage and blood soaked bodies being dragged out of a mashed up sports car and all they got was a rubbish picture of a Cormorant. Actually it really made me laugh. It amused me also that the number of hits on the blog went up because of this. It amused me that someone put the wrong bloody date in the search engine and still ended up here.
Cynically, I could now tell you that the young lad that biked round a park in Fulham for miles to raise money for the victims of the Haiti earthquake, was actually in the patch too. It's in a park that it really is called 'South Park'. I could cynically also mention Simon Cowell (because he conveniently jumped on the bandwagon to get his fizgog onto the front of the papers with the young lad - probably spoiling his day good and proper) and then I could cynically tag on some kind of sexual reference like 'Simon Cowell boob job pictures' or even claim to have secret recordings of Osama Bin Laden, but that would only result in the CIA or MK Ultra snooping around my ass. But that would be silly, and little more than occupatio. But it may amuse me some more to see the stats at the end of the day.
I've digressed quite a bit. I reckon that all the people that don't want to know about the 29th best patch in London have already sworn at me across the etherweb and have left. But then again, so might everyone else. Nonetheless, let's get right up to date with the patch. Stock Dove on the foreshore at lunchtime, Sparrowhawk (small male) being hassled by a crow at lunchtime too (nice). Two more patch year ticks. Still got a half dozen drake Teal knocking about, same for Gadwall but no Pintail at the moment. Gullage interesting, but nothing special amongst them all. No Yellow-legged Gull for ages.
The year list stands at 49.
A Cormorant on some nautical traffic lights. With guano.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
There was a nasty accident on Wandsworth Bridge this morning (my self-imposed patch boundary) and it was very closed, so I went for a bit of rubbernecking – like you do. Fire engines, police, wrecked cars etc etc. Carnage and chaos all round.
As I was walking away from the bridge, there was a Peregrine on the other side of the river having a look at the Starlings coming out of the roost. Cold, cloudy and early. Hardly typical raptor weather at all - but nonetheless it was out hunting. See one in two years and then two in a month. But I'm not complaining.
A cormorant doing landing
Friday, December 18, 2009
Honest! Just you wait and see!
Yes, the patch is quiet. Real quiet. There have been no suprises and very little to report. Minor behavioural nuances, that kind of thing.
Like this. I have seen this kind of activity at distance a couple of times, but recently I had it close enough to digimon some 'pictures' of it. Cormorant v flat fish. A Flounder perhaps? Dunno, I'm rubbish at fish.
The fish is caught and held in the beak at 90 degrees to the angle that the bird needs to swallow it. With a lack of opposing thumbs, this is a bit tricky. So long as it can avoid a GBB getting hold of it, they are usually successful.
But not pretty.
A Cormorant doing pelican
Friday, December 04, 2009
Yes this is about Starlings again, rightly so. The media seem to have been quite keen on Starlings this week, but only really for the big shows that they put on at roosting time and rightly so, but the Wandsworth Bridge birds are not very good at this. They don’t spend too much time in the air once at the site and get into place reasonably quickly. Why is this so?
Helicopters.
Just down river from Wandsworth Bridge there is a heliport. The helicopters use the river as an initial navigation aid (or so it would seem) and come over the bridge at no more than a couple of hundred feet. Just the kind of height that a nice flock of Starlings would like to wheel around and give a show to a hardy patch birder.
That's my theory anyway.
On Tuesday however this was all changed when a Sparrowhawk was showing interest in the murmuration. They stayed out and made a couple of half decent groups in the air, but stayed quite dispersed within the flock rather than the tight knit version they normally have. And they climbed - higher than I've seen them round here. Thankfully no helicopters came by and once the raptor realised that it wasn't going to get a meal it left and they all piled in under the bridge.
The obligatory photograph of a bird that I have not been talking about follows...
A Cormorant doing that thing that they do. With the wings and all that.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Had half an hour to kill this morning so I took the opportunity to do some science. My aim was to count the dispersal of Starlings from the roost again, to see if there was an increase (I had suspected thus - I think that this is my null hypothesis science fans). Anyway, the Starlings were not that keen on rising from their slumber. Crows, Cormorants, Ducks and Gulls are all up before the Starlings, which kind of makes the Starlings the equivalent of a bunch of stroppy avian teens.
Interestingly there was a fair amount of Cormorant movement upriver, dribs and drabs, maximum flock size of 17 and the total that came through was 119. My previous site high was a count of 92. Ornithologically significant. Top hole!
Eventually the Starlings did start to stream out from under the bridge, and in the little time that was left to me (no more than 15 minutes) I counted 2695 birds. I would have expected them to keep coming out for at least another 20 minutes (but not so heavily) and would think that the total could be around about 3500+.
This is an increase from the previous total (which was on a longer time scale) thus proving my null hypothesis. I'll put the 2695 count into Birdtrack I reckon, but keep 3500 as the current estimate for the site usage.
Oh yeah, there was an Egyptian Goose too.
Science - done.
Wandsworth doing right early and everything.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
It seems like ages since I mentioned Coots, and so as not to disappoint regular readers here I go again.
Went to check on the shopping trolley yesterday lunchtime, and initially there was no nesting behaviour to be seen. There was a single Coot there, but it didn't seem that interested in the site. That was until a pigeon had an idea about landing on the shopping trolley to see if it could find something interesting on it. At that point the Coot went mad! It launched itself directly at the pigeon/nest exocet like before the pigeon had finished landing and it flew off. This bird still obviously feels that it needs to protect the site. Just to reiterate that it was the boss, it climbed on to the trolley and gave a bit of foot stamping and loads of threat posturing stuff.
A Coot doing behaviour
It then had a preen and moved back into the water.
After this I found a Cormorant.
A Cormorant doing swimming
After that I found the Grey Wagtail nest (which I am especially pleased with) and I'll try and get some rubbish pics of it today.
Please Barca, please beat Man U. I'll love you long time, please Barca, please!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
I shall diligently risk my Chalfont’s by sitting on a cold step for an hour while watching not much in the name of science (kinda) this weekend because it’s the RSPB Garden Birdwatch thingy. Last year I got about a dozen species, and expect no more than that this year – but there is nothing a patch birder likes more than being forced to watch not much in the name of science. I’ll put some bread out, and hope that the Starlings can get down quick enough before the Woodpigs clear it all up. Bring it on!
Like so many urbanites, putting food out for birds just makes the squirrels fatter, and what they leave behind just brings the rats out. The foxes don’t get much of it so they just raid the bins, leaving them open for the Woodpigs to clear up. I cut a coconut in half and hung it from the tree in the garden the other Sunday (as they were going for 57p in a nameless large supermarket) and the squirrels have stolen them. Completely vanished. Bitten through the string and gone. I doubt if the local Tits even got a sniff of them. Utter bastards.
As an aside, last summer I tried to ‘discourage’ the Woodpigs to leave the garden (did I mention that I detest Woodpigeons?) by use of a water pistol. Of course I had not thought this through properly and when they got squirted, they just quizzically looked at the sky, wondered where the rain was coming from and carried on scoffing bread until their bloody gizzards where totally extended. Utter, utter, bastards.
Ok, have a picture of a Cormorant ‘giving it some’ taken this lunchtime by a man that is outsmarted by pigeons.
