Murder most foul

Kess73

Got to see the end of a very brutal kill earlier today, and non of my regular hawks were involved.

Saw some movement in one of my fields behind my house so went out for a look.

From a distance I thought it was a herring gull on the ground as there have been a few around of late, but as I got closer I saw that this was far bigger than a herring gull and it was killing another bird.

Then all of a sudden it took off and I got to see what a giant it was. An adult Great black backed gull that had set upon a collared dove. Had totally forgotten how big those guys are, like a Herring gull on steroids. It went up high with the dove and dropped it. Then came down to it on the ground and bashed it a few more times.

At that point I walked away from the area as the dove would have been too far gone and scaring off the gull would only have left a dying dove behind that would need to be dispatched anyway.

What struck me was the brutal fashion in which the gull went about it's business. All brute force with no finesse. I am so used to the relatively quick kills by my resident hawks that such a brutal battering really shocked me and has stayed in my head as a result.

When he finally left he took off and headed further inland, which made me suspect that he was heading towards Lough Nagirra (or Tory Hill Lake as some call it) as that would only be six or seven miles from me as the bird flies and is a spot where I have seen large gulls before.

Huge bird though with a massive wingspan. Really flies in a manner that suggests size/weight

doctor evil

Nature is red in tooth and claw.

baaba maal

I've stayed on an uninhabited (by humans!) island off the west coast a few times and the greater and lesser black backs get really territorial (out of breeding season)- they really swoop at you, and although they're not going to make contact you can't help but duck- they are fairly intimidating up close!

ThunderCat

Yea the great black backed gulls are massive. See them every day as i'm right on the coast and there is a noticable size difference between them and the herring gulls who are also very big when up close.
I have a bird book at home that says bald eagles are just about the only birds who are able/known to kill an adult great black backed gull. What a tussle that would be. I'd imagine it would take an extremely hungry bald eagle to attempt it.

Traonach

ThunderCat wrote: »

Yea the great black backed gulls are massive. See them every day as i'm right on the coast and there is a noticable size difference between them and the herring gulls who are also very big when up close.
I have a bird book at home that says bald eagles are just about the only birds who are able/known to kill an adult great black backed gull. What a tussle that would be. I'd imagine it would take an extremely hungry bald eagle to attempt it.

White-tailed eagle are very closely related to Bald eagles. So hopefully someday we might see a Sea eagle v GBBG battle here. At present GBBG are the top avian predators along the coast especially near the large seabird colonies. The maturing Sea Eagles pairs will be wanting those prime territories. They will be no doubt clashes between these two mega birds. Hopefully the Sea eagles are not all poisoned/shot first.

Birdnuts

ThunderCat wrote: »

Yea the great black backed gulls are massive. See them every day as i'm right on the coast and there is a noticable size difference between them and the herring gulls who are also very big when up close.
I have a bird book at home that says bald eagles are just about the only birds who are able/known to kill an adult great black backed gull. What a tussle that would be. I'd imagine it would take an extremely hungry bald eagle to attempt it.

I read a piece late last year in an American journal that mentioned how the return of the Bald Eagle along the US East coast has reduced the numbers of large predatory gulls - I suspect something similiar will happen here when/if the WTSEs are restored to their righfull place on top of the food chain within our marine and freshwater habitats.

Kess73

ThunderCat wrote: »

Yea the great black backed gulls are massive. See them every day as i'm right on the coast and there is a noticable size difference between them and the herring gulls who are also very big when up close.
I have a bird book at home that says bald eagles are just about the only birds who are able/known to kill an adult great black backed gull. What a tussle that would be. I'd imagine it would take an extremely hungry bald eagle to attempt it.

Did a bit of extra reading on Great black backed gull after what I saw the other day as a bit of a refresher on them as well as to learn anything new I could.

White Tailed sea eagles, Bald eagles, and Golden eagles were all listed as being predators of fully grown Great black backed gulls along with a number of different shark and Killer whale.

After seeing the Great black backed gull in action and fairly close up yesterday, it really did hammer home how formidable and powerful each of those three eagles are.

I had a sea eagle on my arm for a little while last summer, and she was a very impressive bird to say the least, but it is only when you see the size and strength of something that she could hunt, that a true appreciation of how wonderful a predator she is starts to grow.

It also started me thinking of a bird that spawned a discussion in the Paleontology forum a year os so ago.

That chat was about a giant eagle known as Haast's Eagle. Basically it was an eagle with a wingspan slightly larger than that of the largest recorded Golden eagle but that was far heavier and much more strongly built. It only became extinct some five or si hundred years ago so it co-existed with man. If our modern eagles are such a sight to behold, I can only imagine what a much stronger and more powerfully built version must have been like to see in action.

Kess73

The recent frost seems to have left my regular female sprawk a tad peckish because for the last three mornings she has turned up very close to the window of the room in which I keep my pc.

Normally she does very little business that close to the house save for her jackdaw killing near the front of the house which tends to be a breeding season thing with her.

But the last few mornings she has been in some of the small trees that the male sprawk uses and does she look clumsy in them. The much smaller make has perfected zipping around those same trees and shrubs and he can do so at great speed on the wing or on foot, but the bigger female is having to move around in there in a stop start motion as she is just that bit too big to fit where the male can.

She just looks so wrong looking clumsy.

Of course the second she leaves that tree she is back to being her regular fast and agile self, but that tree/bush seems to be her kryponite.

It is also amazing the difference she has had on the larger birds the last few days since she has moved closer to the house. The usual mix of jackdaws, magpies, feral pigeons tend to stay around when the male is present with the pigeons often sharing a roof with the male albeit with about ten feet between them, and the magpies will come within a few feet of the male on a wall to give him a few verbals.

But the big female arrives and there is a mass evacuation. The pigeons fast become dots in the sky, the jackdaws cannot be seen, and the magpies cackle from the cover of trees. It is only if there are large gulls or rooks in the area that she gets some close attention.

Her relationship with me fascinates me also as unlike the male she will not tolerate being spotted and anytime she is that close to the house and she spots me watching she bolts. But the male is the total opposite and will stand his ground even when I am out the back. He even tries to mirror me at times in one part of the garden in that when I walk alongside some trees, he matches my movement by walking along the wall on the other side of the trees. If I stop and change direction he does the same.

whyulittle

How do you get anything done at home!?

Kess73

I am terrible for being distracted by something I see outside. It could be a bird flying by, a fox in one of the fields, a plant I had not noticed before etc.

I hear alarm calls from birds and that's me gone until I get to watch what is happening.

stephen_k

There was some amazing footage on the BBC's Autumnwatch of GBBG's hunting rabbits on Scomer Island... Huge birds, would sit outside the rabbits burrow entrance and wait for the rabbit to poke its head out...