Things are quite quiet in my garden at the moment, with less birds (apart from the Sparrows!) than is usual. We have, however, had two not-so-common (for our garden!) visitors. The first one I have mixed feelings about - a juvenile female Sparrowhawk. It's always a thrill to see these birds, but when it takes my sparrows I am torn between rushing for my camera or rushing out to protect the Sparrows. Usually the photographic interest wins. They are only doing what comes naturally, after all!
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| Sparrowhawk (juvenile female) - our garden |
This bird swooped up from behind the fence, landed on the fence, and then peered down into the rhododendron where the Sparrows had all hidden, and went in after them. It was at this point that I went to try and save the Sparrows.
The second visitor was one that I was delighted to see. Not long ago a Migrant Hawker dragonfly was a 'garden first' for us. That time I think it was a female (blue markings were rather pale) . On Thursday we had a male of the species (somewhat deeper blue markings) which stayed for much of the morning.
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| Migrant Hawker (male) - our garden |
This will probably be the last time we find dragonflies in our garden. Tomorrow someone is coming to collect the last of my koi, and then the pond will be shut down, filled in, and converted to a 'growing area'. We will install a very small pond to give the birds something to drink from (maybe even heating it to keep the ice off in the winter), but there are some birds that will almost certainly not feature on my annual garden list again, such as Grey Heron and Grey Wagtail.
Excellent images Richard,great shots of the Migrant Hawker,love the Juv Sparrowhawk,I agree with you, the Camera always wins.
ReplyDeleteJohn.
Thank you, John. Yep, the camera wins, but I do feel a little guilty afterwards!
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