The Hide (chat thread)

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

5 Buzzards came gliding through the garden this morning. I am used to them about the place but these five floated in below the height of the Larch trees and flew around with me standing in the middle of them for about three or four minutes. A real pleasure.

Zoo4m8

Trimming a hedge in front of an old cottage yesterday, engrossed in the job I was vaguely aware of a number of insects flying round me.. It eventually dawned on me they were wasps and I was standing on a very active nest in the long uncut grass..I've never seen such activity at this time of year before.

Pie Man

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

Trimming a hedge in front of an old cottage yesterday, engrossed in the job I was vaguely aware of a number of insects flying round me.. It eventually dawned on me they were wasps and I was standing on a very active nest in the long uncut grass..I've never seen such activity at this time of year before.

Well if a giant stood on your house, you'd be fairy pissed off as well :pac:

Zoo4m8

Half-cocked

Had a pair of Bullfinches in the garden this morning, quite a rare sight in this area. Also a female Blackcap and 10 Collard Doves - we usually only have a pair.

whyulittle

I remember asking before do any of our common birds show up on foreign shores as a mega find. Well, here is one!

Bsal

I just saw a Wheatear at Dublin airport and a Stonechat too, my first time seeing a Stonechat.

stevensi

Bsal wrote: »

I just saw a Wheatear at Dublin airport and a Stonechat too, my first time seeing a Stonechat.

A Wheatear is a good find for December normally they would all have moved on by this stage...I think there was one on the Bull Island in December a couple of years back now that I think of it

whyulittle

Rounding up some Grey Partridge to send up north.

Native Irish Grey Partridge being caught up at the National Parks and Wildlife Service's Grey Partridge Project at Boora Co. Offaly on the 8th December 2014.

These partridge are destined for Co. Down in N. Ireland where Mr. David Sandford is piloting a re-introduction programme.

The species were declared extinct in N. Ireland in 1992.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_U-7oVBUHqM

http://youtu.be/_U-7oVBUHqM

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

There is so much activity around the feeders and on the lawn this morning that it's impossible to get a count of any one species.

Capercaille

25 acres of scrub after been destroyed by neighbouring farmer. He has hardly any cattle/sheep and works fulltime. Did it for the SFP. Would hold a few whitethroat in the summer, the last time I will see them there:(

OpenYourEyes

Kayla Moldy Supernova wrote: »

There is so much activity around the feeders and on the lawn this morning that it's impossible to get a count of any one species.

All part of the fun of keeping count of garden birds I'm sure you'll agree! Won't get any easier over the next few weeks as the weather gets worse and natural food supplies in the wider countryside run low!

Woodville56

Capercaille wrote: »

25 acres of scrub after been destroyed by neighbouring farmer. He has hardly any cattle/sheep and works fulltime. Did it for the SFP. Would hold a few whitethroat in the summer, the last time I will see them there:(

Have seen several instances of similar type habitat destruction lately, smaller scale but cumulatively significant nonetheless ! One site in particular was usually
dependable grasshopper warbler territory during the Atlas survey work.
Also hedges locally being cut to the stumps, not causing obstruction or reduced visibility - just mindless stuff !

Zoo4m8

Cutting a hedge to the stump is coppicing, what might seem a nice perfectly harmless hedge to others might be past it's sell by date as a useful field boundary. Coppicing a hedge will result in a thicker more resilient growth in time.

Woodville56

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

Cutting a hedge to the stump is coppicing, what might seem a nice perfectly harmless hedge to others might be past it's sell by date as a useful field boundary. Coppicing a hedge will result in a thicker more resilient growth in time.

Some of it indiscriminate and pointless though, ditches and banks shaved of any type of vegetation or cover with no regard to habitat value.

OpenYourEyes

There's obviously big differences between hedgerow management and hedgerow destruction - unfortunately one of those big differences seems to be the prevalence of the latter compared to the former!

Zoo4m8

To me hedge management would be cutting , trimming, laying etc etc some good, some bad and some awful but the hedge is still there at the end of the day.
Hedgerow destruction, again to me, is just that, the removal of a hedge for good.
I cannot see , and I've tried.., how you could possibly consider that removal of hedgerows is more prevelant than management, no matter how it's done..

OpenYourEyes

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

To me hedge management would be cutting , trimming, laying etc etc some good, some bad and some awful but the hedge is still there at the end of the day.
Hedgerow destruction, again to me, is just that, the removal of a hedge for good.
I cannot see , and I've tried.., how you could possibly consider that removal of hedgerows is more prevelant than management, no matter how it's done..

Well just for clarity, I'd class giving a hedgerow a very extreme 'short back and sides' as hedgerow destruction too - when their ecological value is damaged for a few years because they have been cut back to such an extreme.

I may have gone slightly overboard there, but in addition to the above I think theres a lot of poor management done too. I think the word 'management' implies that some sort of thought or care is put into the process, but that's often not the case with farmers or local authorities.

At the end of the day, what I was trying to (and should have) said is that if I was asked if we as a country are good at managing our hedgerows, only ok at it, or bad at it, based on my experiences I'd say we are bad at managing our hedegrows.

Woodville56

What I've seen mostly is not really coppicing or strengthening hedges through careful or strategic pruning, it's having hedge cutters shear growth to the stump, taking with it brambles and undergrowth, leaving no foliage or cover for any form of animal, insect or bird life. While the undergrowth will return with the spring, it will take several seasons for the ash, whitethorn etc to regain the stature of what was destroyed.

Capercaille

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

To me hedge management would be cutting , trimming, laying etc etc some good, some bad and some awful but the hedge is still there at the end of the day.
Hedgerow destruction, again to me, is just that, the removal of a hedge for good.
I cannot see , and I've tried.., how you could possibly consider that removal of hedgerows is more prevelant than management, no matter how it's done..

Alot of intensive tillage men have their hedgerows hacked back to near the ground, worthless for biodiversity.

Zoo4m8

Woodville56 wrote: »

What I've seen mostly is not really coppicing or strengthening hedges through careful or strategic pruning, it's having hedge cutters shear growth to the stump, taking with it brambles and undergrowth, leaving no foliage or cover for any form of animal, insect or bird life. While the undergrowth will return with the spring, it will take several seasons for the ash, whitethorn etc to regain the stature of what was destroyed.

Oh dear.. As it will after coppicing or laying......

Woodville56

Well there's coppicing, hedge trimming etc and then there's mindless habitat destruction - that's the point ! Defending the latter in the name of the former won't help biodiversity !

Zoo4m8

Woodville56 wrote: »

Well there's coppicing, hedge trimming etc and then there's mindless habitat destruction - that's the point ! Defending the latter in the name of the former won't help biodiversity !

Oh dear, again...I most certainly am not defending ' mindless habitat destruction' I am pointing out that a hedge cut to the ground messily or tidily will mostly regenerate at the same rate..

Woodville56

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

Oh dear, again...I most certainly am not defending ' mindless habitat destruction' I am pointing out that a hedge cut to the ground messily or tidily will mostly regenerate at the same rate..

How long will it will take a hawthorn, whitethorn or ash tree to regenerate from a stump or after an almost ground level cutting ? Years I guess ? Being from a farming background myself, I understand and appreciate farmers or landowners maintaining their hedgerows in a neat and non obstructive fashion, but on the basis of some of the indiscriminate hedge clearing I've seen, there's little or no thought or regard to maintaining biodiversity in their actions !

Zoo4m8

Standing outside the back door twenty minutes ago, pitch dark, perfectly still and not a sound except for a Robin singing in the back hedge and across the fields two Song Thrushes keeping him company.. Magic..

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Zoo4m8 wrote: »

Standing outside the back door twenty minutes ago, pitch dark, perfectly still and not a sound except for a Robin singing in the back hedge and across the fields two Song Thrushes keeping him company.. Magic..

Likewise here. I was thinking of posting the same thing half an hour ago! We must be in the same place .
It's mornings like this that make you happy to be able to enjoy them

Woodville56

Robins here also on song this rainy morning here in north midlands and last week in the local woodland a solitary song thrush in full voice as if it was spring but on a perfectly still grey Decenber morning.
Anthony McGeehan's take on Robin song here -

https://www.facebook.com/anthonymcgeehan/posts/608589972602121:0

Zoo4m8

Kayla Moldy Supernova wrote: »

Likewise here. I was thinking of posting the same thing half an hour ago! We must be in the same place .
It's mornings like this that make you happy to be able to enjoy them

Indeed..moments of 'small wonder' ...we're not from the same place but I suspect from maybe the same vintage!
I feel privileged to have lived a life full of these moments that to me rank alongside the spectacular , and continue to live a very active lifestyle with something new to learn or see or experience all the time... Standing at the front of a open sided shed this evening leaning on a shovel after checking that all the drains and watercourses were clear, a Sika hind trotted round the end of the shed, I don't know who got the biggest surprise , me , my dog or the deer!, she hopped over the hedge and disappeared in the gloom across the field..
And so it goes on.. Moments of small wonder.

Capercaille

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjOtD63UwhU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrRmv5vfKEc
A short film on the reintroduction program of Corncrake to England

Cork boy 55

CSI
Can Anyone identity these feathers?
Main guess is wood pigeon or collared dove.