A few surprises mostly good!

Little and large

A leap of faith

Some of the better surprises of the past 2 weeks, with a lull in NT and Wildlife Trust activities, included a brief encounter with an adventurous fox cub on one of the single track lanes near Snowshill plus an enjoyable view of a female greater spotted woodpecker in hawthorn trees early morning on Cleeve Common. This followed by a male greater spotted woodpecker at Snowshill,  kingfishers at Slimbridge, and Peregrines including chicks in the nest at Symonds Yat together with brief sighting of a kingfisher on the Wye {plus unconfirmed distant Goshawk sighting mixed in with buzzards and a raven}.

A brief visit to Sherborne this week confirmed the health of the 3 Broadwater cygnets ignorant of the buzzard overhead being mobbed by rooks. On the way to the water meadows the sheep were being sheared, quite timely in the rising June temperatures. Down by the Windrush  Goldfinches, female Bullfinch, long tailed tits plus a blue flash of yet another Kingfisher which was surveying one of the water ditches feeding into the Windrush. The red kites were also enjoying the weather until they strayed into one of the Lapwing nesting areas which resulted in a pair of lapwing showing their aggressive behaviour in defence of their nest.

Not so good was some surprise & unwelcome visitors to my house late over the bank holiday who fortunately failed in their attempted burglary but resulted in me becoming part of the crime statistics. The type of 'wildlife' I don't like!

Meanwhile back to 'driven' grouse shooting and its impact on wildlife {especially hen harriers}.