I'm fairly sure I saw 4 swifts over Mortonhall this morning, but was too far away to be certain.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Leisure
Wildlife highlight of the day
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Posted 5 months ago #
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From Craigmillar Castle then on to Mortonhall...they're coming my way!
(Lots of swallows and martins at Kailzie gardens today - and more squished insects on my windscreen when I got home than I've seen on a long time.)
Posted 5 months ago # -
I noticed the large number of squished insects as I drove up to Edinburgh today (actually thought it was raining at one point) in my wide and long car after a week away that turned into four weeks at my parents' house due to them both getting COVID for the first time in relay (but not from me fortunately, and I somehow got away without getting it again). Sadly I also saw four squashed badgers between Broughton and Penicuik.
Posted 5 months ago # -
Back on topic again, I did see swifts in Preston (although should this be in the swift thread?) as well as The Kingsknowe Rat swimming across the Lancaster Canal. Also lots of bats around dusk on the local lark and at least one tawny owl.
Posted 5 months ago # -
I have heard that the swans at Boroughmuir have cygnets, but I didn't see any as I passed this morning - presumably they were asleep or maybe not yet all hatched in the nest under one of the parents. However, I did see a family of maybe seven cygnets out of the water on the far side of the canal at the turning area prior to Gogar Station Road. I assume that they are likely to have been the family from the nest in the Wester Hailes lagoon.
Posted 5 months ago # -
Three newly hatched grey cygnets at Boroughmuir this morning.
One Neddie Hi5 this evening same place
Lot of civilians out standing staring at swans
Posted 5 months ago # -
Swan family at The Shore in Leith today (as reported on the lowlights thread):
Nine cygnets with one egg still on the nest near the swing bridge. No obvious interest from other homo sapiens sighted in the vicinity.
Also in the vicinity of the swing bridge:
Is it at all unusual for Eider to be seen there? I saw four males altogether, plus one female. The males could occasionally be heard practising their Frankie Howerd calls.
Posted 5 months ago # -
I have no idea how usual or unusual it is, but there are several on North Berwick beach at the moment. I wouldn't have been able to identify them without seeing your post.
Posted 5 months ago # -
I saw three cygnets paddling around
At Boroughmuir, at Boroughmuir
I saw three cygnets paddling around
At half four in the afternoonOne of the parents was churning up the water at the far side from the towpath to give them more sediment to feed on. It looks like some eggs haven't hatched.
Posted 5 months ago # -
Both swan families spotted out and about on the canal this morning. Wester Hailes is indeed a total of seven cygnets.
Posted 5 months ago # -
The cygnets are growing. I'm spotting the Boroughmuir family fairly routinely on my cycle commutes, but the Wester Hailes family are far more elusive since they seem to be heading out further west than I cycle some of the time. I have also seen a family with six cygnets on Craiglockhart pond a couple of times.
I think I reported previously about the complete lack of swans on The Loch at Heriot-Watt this summer, although there is a goose family with a couple of goslings, which makes a change.
I have also spotted the Kingsknowe Rat a couple of times lately: crossing the pavement and heading into the bushes part way up Gibson Terrace on Tuesday evening, and crossing the towpath and heading into the canal today at Kingsknowe, of all places...
Posted 4 months ago # -
Never seen so many ladybirds together.
On driftwood just above tideline.
Posted 4 months ago # -
Two foxes enjoying the late morning sunshine yesterday at Mortonhall campsite.
Also spotted swifts over our house for the first time yesterday, and again nearby this morning.
Posted 4 months ago # -
A hedgehog!! In our garden!!!
It pottered around for several minutes before pottering off again. There's a dish of water for cats or birds (we have a bird bath too) so it might have come for that.
Posted 3 months ago # -
What, by my brief internet searching, appears to be an elephant hawk-moth caterpillar in the front garden.
Posted 3 months ago # -
I spotted a couple of slow worms in the Lake District on the path around the lower shore of Ullswater the week before last. They were the first slow worms that I have spotted myself that were alive. One was completely stationary, soaking up the sun, and the other slithered across the path in front of me so fast that I barely had time to take my phone out to try to video it. Someone was cycling the route that day on a full suspension MTB, which seemed like it would be extremely challenging in places...
Posted 2 months ago # -
Other night walking by the WoL by the Hive Stadium. Flocks of birds flying towards or perched on the stadium lights. Some high calls. Too big, and too high for sparrows, too small for starlings. Would those be swifts?
Posted 2 months ago # -
Also on WoL the water is so low that the ducks are paddling rather than swimming.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Unlikely to be swifts if they were perching. As their scientific name says, they don't have feet (apodidae - although they do actually have feet, they're not much good for perching, mainly clinging). Plus I think most of the swifts and their hirundine cousins have departed southwards by now. (Swifts that have fledged this summer will remain on the wing continuously for 2 or 3 years before seeking a nesting site back here.
Posted 2 months ago # -
@ejstubbs - thanks for that. Not swifts then - any idea what they could be?
Posted 2 months ago # -
I am going to put my hands up and say I was partly mistaken about the hirundines, since I saw a couple of swallows flying and calling under one of bridges over the canal. (I was travelling eastbound having joined the canal off Cultins Road; it was one of the first few bridges you pass under in that direction but I can't remember exactly which one.)
That said, I think they were leaving it quite late to get on their way to Africa. Maybe they had squeezed in a late brood before heading off? I haven't consciously notyiced any other swallows about for a good week or two.
Which actually leads me to a possible answer to your question: it may be that what you saw were actually swallows. They do tend to gather together in groups before setting off on migration, and they do chatter amongst themselves as they assemble on some convenient perch (they can and do perch, unlike swifts). When I were a kid in Derby I used to get swallows congregating and chattering away on the telephone wire outside my bedroom window at this time of year. Which was very nice - but it also meant that the school holidays were coming to an end ☹️
I don't know whether that might fit with what you saw & heard?
Posted 2 months ago # -
Just spotted the Heriot-Watt Stoat out of the corner of my eye, flowing along the edge between the grass and trees just outside my office. That's the first time I've seen it in several years.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Approx 50 swallows feeding before heading south at top of harlaw road just there.
Then round at clubbiedeans abouout 20 small passerines feeding and flying about like swallows but without the swallow tail. Copyists with white band on wings.
Posted 2 months ago # -
@ejstubbs - no they weren't swallows - they didn't have the distinct tails.
Posted 2 months ago # -
@ejstubbs - yes, the swallows are the harbingers of autumn, then the geese in formation honking over the Pentlands.
"Gathering swallows twitter in the skies."
Is it possible the birds I saw were house martins?
Posted 2 months ago # -
(Yesterday)
Largish, youngish fox
NEPN, near Wardie Road
Moved every time I tried to take its photo!
Posted 2 months ago # -
I nearly stood on the hedgehog in our back garden the other day! I was concentrating on getting some washing which had been left out until after it got dark, not watching out for wildlife.
Posted 2 months ago # -
@Rosie: I'm not so familiar with house martin behaviour but it seems that they do both forage in groups, and gather in groups before departing on migration. They tend to fly higher than swallows when hunting for insects* - swallows will be down close to the water, or dodging between the taller plants when hunting over meadows. Bear in mind that house martins also have white underparts like swallows do - especially noticeable is the white rump which can be seen from behind, which swallows don't have. If the birds you saw didn't have white underparts then they probably weren't house martins.
I notice that in your post which kicked off this sub-thread you mentioned that the birds you saw were "too small for starlings". I'm just wondering whether a Father Ted perspective error might have crept in, since otherwise the behaviour you described sounds very starling-like, including the high-pitched calls. Starlings can make lots of different noises; they're renowned for their mimicry** and the ones round here seem to enjoy pretending to be swifts in late spring, just to get me all excited...
* Whereas sand martins do seem to be fond of low flying. I remember once when I was checking out the sand martin colony in Green Cleuch, they were flying past within just a couple of feet of where I was standing, no higher than knee height. (They were probably far too busy foraging for insects for their broods to worry about the miniscule risk of predation by a lumbering 6ft tall ape descendant.)
** When I were a kid in Derby, a consultant surgeon at the DRI used to live a few doors down from us. This was in the days before mobile phones so he had the GPO fit external bell at the back of his house in case an urgent bit of slicing & stitching was needed. The local starlings soon learned to mimic it, which he found more than a little annoying after a while, dashing into the house for avian-generated false alarms.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Two ravens soaring over the north Pentland ridge earlier in the week. We spotted what we assumed to be them again later on, giving a bit of an aerobatic display and with two others in attendance. (A bit of a lowlight later on in the walk when we found a dead one by the side of the path above Green Craig.)
Posted 2 months ago #
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