CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Leisure
Wildlife highlight of the day
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Posted 2 years ago #
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Heard an owl last night in the Hermitage of Braid.
Posted 2 years ago # -
I saw a red squirrel scamper in front of me while riding on the edge of the Ochils yesterday. I also saw a sparrow hawk and a twilight Owl in a similar area.
I thought I then heard an owl on the Dunfermline/Alloa railway path but as I caught a group of teenagers a couple of moments later I doubt it was.
Posted 2 years ago # -
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Edinburgh has so much more wildlife, from deer and otters to kestrels, compared to the past
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Posted 2 years ago # -
@chdot - interesting article. I wonder if the attitude of gardeners has increased the wildlife, as now they don't go mad with herbicides and pesticides and keeping their gardens clinically tidy. They build insect hotels and leave the dead winter foliage about as habitats and turn lawns into wildflower meadows.
Everyone seems to have seen the otters except me, and I regularly go on patrol along the Water of Leith.
The bullfinches are now constant visitors to my bird feeder, and they are a cheering sight.
Posted 2 years ago # -
There was a hint of wild garlic on today's ride (by the Esk)
Posted 2 years ago # -
It's starting to sprout around easy Craigs too. I'm not sure if I could smell it or if my mind said I could because it was visible.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Cheese and onion crisps :)
Posted 2 years ago # -
Mountain hare, with its winter jacket on, near Loch Brandy.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Two house sparrows on my bird feeders this morning. This is a highlight for me because I haven't seen any in our garden for a good couple of years. Before that they used to turn up in gangs and empty my four-perch seed feeder within a day or two. Then all of a sudden, no more sparrows chez nous, although there were still a fair few in and around the neighbourhood.
And by a massive coincidence, today is actually World Sparrow Day!
Posted 2 years ago # -
Male sparrowhawk
Posted 2 years ago # -
Two ravens spotted flying northwards as we were walking along the Lymphoy track. One of them was doing its close-the-wings-and-do-a-half-roll display flight trick so presumably/hopefully a pair.
I hereby withdraw unconditionally any skepticism I may have expressed in the past towards Balerno-ites reporting raven sightings from their gardens.
Also two house martins zooming around above the WoL on our way back to Balerno. First this year. Lots of nuthatch calling, and two very dapper-looking treecreepers foraging within ten feet of where we were standing watching them. Plus the usual innumerable wrens, robins, blackbirds etc. And thrushes both song and mistle. Oh, and something that I think might have been a sparrowhawk calling in the area around the rugby pitches.
It's all starting to kick off out there.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Currie, and spied what I thought was a butterfly darting in a hedge. Then saw it was a wren. How amazingly tiny they are.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Walking near Ormiston, lots of skylarks and general bird chatter. First yellowhammer calls of the year for me. Blackcap
Posted 2 years ago # -
I was on the road at 6:30 yesterday and saw a deer on the NCN1 cycle path next to the golf course at Barnton. It quickly made off.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Visiting my parents. Mum said "Something happened" - and there were pigeon feathers all over the grass at the back. Mum thought cat rather than sparrowhawk.
After a while, all the sparrows spotted the feathers and came down and took them away.(Mum was lightheartedly 'complaining' about sparrows copulating on the shed roof.)
Posted 2 years ago # -
If it was just feathers then cat does seem most likely. A sparrowhawk would struggle to carry away prey the size of a pigeon intact and would generally 'process' it in situ, leaving a stripped carcass behind. Of course, that could then have been 'tidied up' by something like a fox.
We had a female sparrowhawk do precisely this in our back garden a few years back. Its crop was visibly bulging when it finally decided it had done what it could with its kill, and it actually seemed to be having a little difficulty getting airborne with the extra load on board!
Posted 2 years ago # -
Posted 2 years ago #
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Two dippers foraging on the Braid Burn in Braidburn Valley Park - within feet of each other so likely a pair. They were on the bit of the burn that runs through a sort of tree tunnel at the north end of the park when we saw them. It's not that unusual to see dippers on the Braid Burn but we more usually see them in the Hermitage rather than in the somewhat busier and more open park.
Posted 2 years ago # -
A pair of collared doves on the NEPN. They are so dainty and graceful compared to their lumbering wood pigeon cousins that bulldoze round my garden.
Also I've been getting green finches on the feeder. I heard today that their numbers were falling but are now picking up.
Posted 2 years ago # -
This is probably not good news -
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Climate change: Spring egg-laying shifts by three weeks
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Posted 2 years ago # -
Well it’s a highlight in the sense of giving advice about doing something
Posted 2 years ago # -
At least someone seems to be happy to have been relocated to West Calder: https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/lifestyle/outdoors/watch-cute-russian-bear-byara-does-somersaults-as-she-moves-into-new-home-at-west-lothians-five-sisters-zoo-3674795 (I didn't detect any actual somersaults in the video but hey, it's a happy-looking bear, what more do you want?)
Delayed in Belgium on her way from Russia for two years due to Coronavirus, apparently. Do you think she was wondering "why the big pause"?
I'll get my coat...
Posted 2 years ago # -
Left the house at 6 and headed over to Preston Island, Fife. Rewarded with 2 deer sightings - one near Rosyth Naval Base the other at the Valleyfield lagoons :)
Posted 2 years ago # -
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hedgehogs.
Not the anti-tank defences set up to stop invading forces, but the small prickly animals. They have taken advantage of the suddenly empty streets to roam more widely than they used to, forcing the animal-loving patrol car drivers to swerve wildly or slam on the brakes, if they want to avoid squashing the little curfew breakers.
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Posted 2 years ago # -
Two foxes on the NEPN as I cycled home rather late at night.
Posted 2 years ago #
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