Fly past

I have not been reporting much from "My Patch" mainly due to the fact there really has been nothing to report, very quite from a birding point of view. With Autumn not being too far away (I know, but its a true) I have been putting a little bit more food variety around my hide, in the past months everything I have put down has been stolen by the Crows, Jackdaws, Horse's and even the Sheep so I decided not to put too much premium food out, just some old budgie sweepings and a few peanuts and sunflower hearts.
Although I said not much was happening on the patch it certainly was as I passed the old Kestrel box and saw this great big Tup (Ram) complete with harness ready for action.

Line em up, I'm ready.

It was not long before he was in action too, right under my nose not exactly what you want to be greeted with when out birding.

Will Lamb be OK?

I got to my hide, unlocked and set up my camera in case a bird did decide to pay visit, what I really wanted to do was set up a few perches in readiness for the time the birds were really hunting food, then I would be ready for them.

My hide as today.

There is an old tree trunk that I have had my eye on for some time, so today I decided I would have a go at shifting it. It was not the brightest of idea's as it was only on Friday I put my back out cutting the Ma-in-Law's lawns, all three of them. Anyway I decided to give it a go, I reckon I thought I was Geoff Capes for a minute. Although I could lift it, I was certainly not going to shift it far. I abandoned that one and looked elsewhere. I came across an old Hawthorn hedge root that Joe at some point decided to grub out, that would do I thought, shame it was about as far from the hide as you could get. I set about placing it in situ at the hide, but I am not happy with it, it seems wherever I put it something was amiss, I am sure as I settle down over the next few months I will find the right spot for it.

The view from my hide

By now I was too knackered to do much now but sit down, so I settled in the hide for an hour or so. As I said there has not been a lot about, just a few baby Blue-tits and a baby Robins put in an appearance which I was very grateful for.

Juvenile Blue-tit

Juvenile Robin

I sat trying not to doze off which is a very easy thing to do in the hide for some reason, I started to tick off the birds I had seen in my birding book when I heard the unmistakable sound of the Moorhen, where was he/she? I watched for a few minute when out from the back of my woodpile it put in an appearance fleetingly.

Moorhen

One thing that always disappoints me although I understand it has to happen is the spraying of the nettles. If they were left unchecked they would take over the land but nettles are the place where Butterflies lay there eggs and feed, if we all removed this habitat our Countryside would be a poorer place. The Autumn colours are starting to appear already as can be seen from this next image.

Dead Nettles



As I was heading for home, as if to say hello, one of the young Kestrels flew bye. I would like to think he waved at me for helping him and his family through the hard times, but then you would all say I had lost the plot.