Aerial combat

Bonedigger

I saw this fascinating aerial display yesterday between a corvid(I think it's a crow,but could be a raven?) and a raptor.It was at some distance away and lasted for several minutes.Would anyone care to guess what the raptor is?I'm slightly embarrassed to say I'm struggling to tell what it is,despite the fact the tail-shape and wing profile are visible!

Tiercel Dave

I'll open the bidding with female Kestrel! Dave

Desmo

Wild guess here because I find raptors hard but: peregrine? mainly based on probable size?

OpenYourEyes

Kestrel for me as well, and based on the size I'd say female too.

dodderangler

Kestrel and a rook? Kestrels being as small as they are a raven would literally dwarf it so I'm going with a rook

Desmo

ok, kestrel it is then

IrishDerbyfan

Saw a similar event at Glendalough on Saturday. It was deffo a Peregrine and raven

Desmo

I have seen also seen raven vs. peregrine (in UCD). The peregrine retaliated by stooping at the raven and missing by inches.

jmkennedyie

Looks like kestrel and rook to me too. Raven has a thick beak, diamond shaped tail. That crow's (i.e. corvid's) tail is rounded and the beak seems thin (and grey?) in one of the pics.

I once came across a rook mobbing a kestrel that was mobbing a buzzard on a haystack. Seeing very few kestrel in North Kildare in recent years...buzzards much more common

Bonedigger

jmkennedyie wrote: »

Looks like kestrel and rook to me too. Raven has a thick beak, diamond shaped tail. That crow's (i.e. corvid's) tail is rounded and the beak seems thin (and grey?) in one of the pics.

I once came across a rook mobbing a kestrel that was mobbing a buzzard on a haystack. Seeing very few kestrel in North Kildare in recent years...buzzards much more common

I'm in south Kildare and have seen three kestrels in the past month - the one above(which I obviously didn't know was a kestrel at the time),a roadkill and a kestrel that was perched on an electricity pylon(and as is typical,didn't have my camera at the time!:().I was speaking to a chap from north of the border several weeks ago and he said the kestrel population has plummeted up there in recent years.I met him in Pollardstown fen and he had driven up the country from Co.Cork and said he counted eighteen kestrels along the motorway(all alive I might add) on his way up,something unheard of in his part of the world.