.JPG)
Due to a last minute cancellation, we are short of just one volunteer for tomorrow (Friday's) watch point between about 10.45 and 1.30. No previous experience is required, just a willingness to help to show others the birds you have been enjoying on line. We will have to cancel unless we can find a second volunteer.
If you are free tomorrow and could help (and live close to Derby) please ring DWT on 01773 881188 for fuller details and a chat about what's required as soon as possible today (Thursday).
There are also some gaps next week which need filling too......
Many thanks,
Nick B (DWT)
34 comments:
A few minutes ago there was one bird below the nestbox and these two handsome/beautiful, as the case may be :-) birds at the pudding cam:
http://members.cox.net/katkolling/derbyjune19.JPG
Last night one bird was cuddled right up to the pudding cam for some time.
Just seen 3 of the chicks on the pudding cam, one just flown off as an adult arrived, looks like they are all doing just fine.
Gaz. Matlock
Have had three offers to help tomorrow so many thanks to all three of you. However, if anyone out there would like to help this year or next do please get in touch.
The watch point will continue hopefully until the end of the month, at least.....
Nick B (DWT)
Three juvies having a meal in front of the cam. Great to watch, really amazing.
Will have hundreds of pics again today!
(Wish I lived nearby I would love to help at the watchpoint.)
Froona
Hi, froona,
I just looked at your blog. I think your first pic, I can't tell without time stamps, with the very flapping wings, is when the late afternoon snack was falling off the area near the pudding cam and the juvie was trying to either keep it or avoid going with it.
Not sure if the last of the photos was just before that or unrelated.
Witnessed quarry taken today not so much a stoop more of a leisurely bind clearly seeing the falcon bend down in flight and severe the spinal column at the base of the skull. An eyass joined the fray and a few attempted food passes followed. Not great light for long range photograpy but managed a few.
Regards
Colin
Somebody really likes that camera :-)
http://members.cox.net/katkolling/derbycloseup.JPG
BC Canada 9.01am
nice to see a falcon back in the nest.
Pax BC Canada 9.39am
Yes Karen Ann, your right about the pudding cam, I am sure one falcon was just bowing at it! :-)
Had a wnderful day of picture taking from your tower top camera. Thanks so much for all these past few weeks of hard work you have all put in. Enjoyed it so very much. Please save me a copy of the D.V.D. Am sending a money order tomorrow but will take time to get there from Canada. Don't want to miss out. Hopefully things will continue to go well for you all and our beloved birds. Best wishes and thanks again for this amazing experience. Ann
What exactly does the term " pudding cam " mean... I'm at a loss.. thanks..
Its the fact that it looked like a christmas pudding during the development stages.
pudding cam explanation link:
http://derbyperegrines.blogspot.com/2008/01/pudding-cam.html
Karen Anne, I have only just uploaded all the pics of today, so the pics you refer to where not on my Blog yet;)
In my post here I refered to the big prey which was first delivered to the nestsite at 12:42 and then brought to the pudding. With 3 waiting eager customers!
By the way did you all see this amazing bonding behaviour between the parents in the scrape at 17:45!! Love to see that after the kids have left the nest. Pics on my Blog of course.
Has been a great day indeed! Wonderful!
Glad you got volunteers for today's watch point - I REALLY wanted to do it but my husband wouldn't let me - I don't know, what's the problem, I only live 105 miles away and he'd get no lunch or dinner! I'll see what I can wangle for slots for the rest of the month. Enjoy, all of you lucky 3, I'm so jealous.
SueH, Wendover Bucks
You lot are just blood thirsty. I bet you would have been in the baying crowd when the Christians were thrown to the lions. PITY IT IS NOT YOU>
Read this:-
The myth of some sages that global warming and de habitation are the probable causes of rapidly declining song birds population of the North American Continent.
The "Sages" are turning a blind eye and won't admit that
RAPTORS ARE DESTROYING BETWEEN 4 MILLION AND 7 MILLION SONGBIRDS EVERY DAY OF THE YEAR.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ever day!
Dear Anon,
If raptors were the cause of the increasing songbird loss, you would expect that loss to have declined as raptors have declined due to DDT and other causes. Instead songbird loss has been increasing.
Raptors eat songbirds, just as songbirds eat worms and seeds and fruit, and most humans, unfortunately, eat other animals. Thus it has been for millennia, in a balanced environment.
You might as well get mad at sharks for eating other fish.
It is humans, with their enormous habitat destruction, poisoning the environment with chemicals like DDT, and now causing global warning, who are leading to climate upheaval, desertification, sea level rises, crop and other plant losses, and the loss of so many animal species who depend on the things humans are destroying.
Look at all the mess it has caused to the nice building. It looks dead to me keeping my fingers crossed!
The slight mess which has been caused to the cathedral if that is what the last contributor is referring to is not damaging. The guardians of the cathedral would not allow the birds to be there if they were to cause long term damage. The birds do in fact protect the building from the damage which was being caused by the pigeons which were residing there. This damage has now significantly reduced.
The diet of the peregrines is varied and is monitored to see what they are taking. With most of the birds being the local pigeons. Which most people are happy to see removed. If you took the time to observe these beautiful birds you would indeed see that the are not performing an act of violence but killing cleanly and quickly to feed their young and themselves. The observers do not wish to observe death but to witness the grace and beauty of the birds. If you are not able to observe and understand this yourself then more is the pity for you. Perhaps you should be contributing to another website and leave this for the people who enjoy this one. However everyone is entitle to their own opinion as a regular visitor to the watch point I have to say your opinion is in a very small minority.
Chris M
I totally agree with Chris M 100%.
Anyway - Male adult brought back a "swift" early this morning. Think of all the extra insects we will have to cope with now.
The mess gets clean up by natural activities such as other birds (i.e. Ravens for example) and the good old british rain.
The Cathedral has not changed in the three years I've been visiting!
How can anyone criticise these beautiful birds who usually kill outright in order to survive. That is nature, we may not like it, but that it is how it has always been. Animals kill to survive, they tend not to torture their victims for the fun of it or for exploitation unlike humankind. We have an awful lot to answer for. We need to examine our own behaviour first.
Had to have my say.
Anna, Ripley
Thanks for sense prevailing/returning... btw Is that 'Tiddler' back in the nest box?
John
Is that 'Tiddler' who has been sat in front of the pudding cam all morning? what a poser! both him and his sister or brother in the scrape seem to be having a very lazy morning. has anyone seen the other two yet?
Gaz @ Matlock
Note for "Froona"
Please see my message to you on the comments below this.
Wednesday, June 18
Licenced to Thrill comments
Re you blog.
Thank you to the DWT for responding to my call for asistance earlier. Hopefully courtesy and ornithology has once more become Zeitgeist of this amazing site. xxx Penny
Is that 'Tiddler' on the nest scrape? Just tried to get the live cam but it's not working. Please, please keep up the good work, I do think some people talk some rubbish. Received our Peregrin DVD yesterday and have just watched it, its FANTASTIC so well put together. We must encourage these birds as they are all part of the foodchain and watch what pesticides are used. We occassionally have a Sparrowhawk land in our garden, another beautiful bird but some of my feathered friends do come to grief and this saddens me, but, this is life. Keep up the good work and looking forward to coming into Derby to see them in flight hopefully.
Regards sightings of others;there has been an Eagle Owl! on the communication tower of Ilkeston Police Station on Heanor Road for two/three years.Its not April 1st.is it?
Dennis,local lad
No Dennis - not April 1st. But it was kind of someone to point out this plastic bird.
Earlier I saw you asked if there had ever been any discussion on telemetry with the eyasses when they were rung, to monitor them more closely. The answer is No, we've not considered this (apart from in our dreams). We don't see any real need to monitor their movements in the way that we might if they'd been a migratory race.
We have considered an infra-red camera to see or confirm whether or not prey brought back at night was actually night-caught, rather than a retrieved cache. But again cost, time and opportunity means this is also a pipe dream at present.
I'm glad you're not doing telemetry. I cringe every time I see a photo of a bird with one of those devices strapped around their body. I would go nuts if I had something like that strapped on me for the rest of my life.
i hear there is a pair of nesting eagle owls not far away from the hawks nest i really hope not as this could be the end of the hawks as you well no they feed on hawks
Please don't feed the anonymous troll. Probably past their bedtime now, anyway. :)
I used to hate the magpies visiting my garden and swooping on the songbirds that I'd attracted to my feeders. Of course, I would be horrified to see a magpie carry off one of the little fledglings but watching this website and others like it has taught me a lot.
The fact the magpies are here is a sign that the ecosystem around here is healthy. We've had dozens of new young birds this year, including our first ever bullfinches.
Nature can be cruel. I take no pleasure in watching the peregrines kill and eat except that it's a measure of success in preserving these fantastic creatures. Peregrines don't toy with their prey. They kill as quickly as possible. It's not done for fun or entertainment.
Man did not create these predators. However, he very nearly eradicated them by use of pesticides. The Derby folk are merely trying to address that and by way of doing so, educating many of us in the process with the webcams, which show us things that we could never otherwise expect to see in our lifetimes.
I have learned to accept the predatory magpies in my garden and even admire them. After all, they are quite beautiful birds themselves. I also learned that many songbirds have more than one brood per year and these broods can be plentiful. So whilst I wouldn't want to watch a magpie kill a finch in my garden, I would be pretty naieve to believe it's never going to happen and no matter what, the magpies won't be eradicating the finches.
By the way, the magpies have adapted to some clever acrobatics in order to gorge themselves on the RSPB bird cake I put out. I'm happy with that. The more they stuff themselves with cake, the less interest they'll have in the other birds!
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