"I'm afraid we have an infestation" are not the first words you want to hear when you check into your hotel on holiday, but this happened to us recently in Portugal. "What of?" I asked. "Seagulls" replied the manager, "we us an eagle to scare them away"!!! At this my ears pricked up and I scanned the information leaflet he gave me, and I quote "In order to be able to control in an effective and ecological way we use the method of astonishment with the use of birds of prey where there is no physical damage to the invading birds." Now bear in mind the hotel is built on a cliff above the ocean and they are claiming an invasion of seabirds, I'm pretty sure the seagulls have been nesting here way
St Aidans country park near Leeds is home to around 25% of the UK’s breeding black necked grebes so a must to visit in Spring. The site was until 2002 a huge opencast mine but once mining finished and after some arguments about land ownership it was taken on by the RSPB as it’s latest site. The first thing you notice on arrival at the site and it’s pretty hard to miss, is Oddball a preserved walking dragline which was used to strip mine the coal from the surface. And it’s huge. It is also currently the nest site of a pair of kestrels and little owls have also nested among this monolith from our recent past. The black necked grebes are a small diving bird feeding on insects and crustaceans. T
Last year I promised myself that I would spend more time out on the moors which make up a lot of the higher ground in this part of Yorkshire. The moors tend to be above the tree line so are windswept rough land generally grazed by sheep. This makes them the perfect habitat for the UK and Europe’s largest wading bird the curlew. They are instantly recognisable by their long down curved bill, long legs and their evocative and haunting call. They return to the moors in spring to nest between the tussocks of rough grass, setting the nest down and hidden from predators. They are territorial at this time of year but will react as a group if there is a threat in the area, flying low and loudly to d
