This morning's fantastic haul (1 Viewer)

[CWH]

This morning's stroll was well worth getting up for!
At the feeder: sparrow (noisy but not squabbling yet; some yellow-gaped chicks among them), goldfinch (their wonderful colours don’t stand out so much in the shadow), greenfich (comparatively heavy-bodied male feeding a female), chaffinch (male; seems the females aren't out and about yet), rock dove (of course!), starling (just one - must be the out-rider), blackbird (male and gathering food).
Across the croft: lapwing (3 pairs, protecting their scrapes; at least 2 sets have chicks; noisy, feisty, attacking any and every perceived threat, from lambs to vans to people to gulls), redshank (breeding pair: pretty birds with extraordinarily bright legs and remarkably shrill call; small but standing their ground against the lapwing), lark (constant background presence and song).
On the foreshore: oystercatcher (just waking up, beaks seeming very heavy and not yet calling), plover (scuttling about like mice), heron (ponderous flight along to the next inlet), curlew (always look unbalanced; but that call! - eerie, echoing), common gull (floating around among the rocks), tern (a bit further out and fishing), shelduck (pair, with just one chick; very disappointing as they raised 7 last year).
Back across the croft: carrion crow (uncommon around here), raven (family of 4; wing-beat is as distinctive a sound as their constant chatter), snipe (they like to sit in the reeds just next to the track; call like a creaky gate, and "drumming" of the feathers), hooded crow (big, intelligent birds that should really be called "cloaked"), and finally a cuckoo (flying across to land on a telegraph wire just a couple of metres away from the hoodie, and calling all the time - they aren’t shy birds!).
Right: time for a cuppa!

 

[DBK]

I can't compete with that.

When I went down to make the tea this morning we had our resident grey squirrel rummaging around under the feeder and a female greater spotted woodpecker on the nut feeder helping itself. The squirrel is there almost every morning and will stay for at least fifteen minutes cleaning up everything on the ground - which is really helpful. I don't see the woodpecker every day but it probably comes more than once and the male (red on back of head) also comes but their visits are brief and easily missed.

We do have a regular pair of bullfinches coming. The male is very striking. Goldfinches by the bucket load.

 

[Shrimp]

The CL we were on had a resident cock Pheasant, several females under his protection, two Partridges wander thru occasionally, Green Woodpeckers in the grass and both spotted Woodpeckers hammering the trees above the van, we knew deer came thru but never saw them, heard Owls all round!

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[AndyPK]

A couple of starlings....... . Oh, and lots of hedgehog poo!

 

[jockaneezer]

All sounds of my childhood, growing up on the shores of the Solway Firth. Hadn't realised I hadn't heard a cuckoo for ages until I visited my pal on Mull a few years back where they were the soundtrack to our May visit.

 

[Otter Spotter]

You paint a lovely picture of where I would love to live not just camp. Are you on the Scottish West Coast?

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[CWH]

Oh, and lots of hedgehog poo!

Oh well, if we're talking poo... plenty of the sheep variety! (wouldn't know hedgehog poo if I saw it!)

Hadn't realised I hadn't heard a cuckoo for ages until I visited my pal on Mull a few years back where they were the soundtrack to our May visit.

Ours haven't quite got into 24-hours-a-day nobody-can-sleep-a-wink mode yet

You paint a lovely picture of where I would love to live not just camp. Are you on the Scottish West Coast?

north-west Skye, Dave