Nightmares do come true......

Lockdown was always predicted to be a time when those who persecute Raptors would reap their cruel slaughter. I've watched not so much in dismay, but in a resigned "we told you you so". The short video below I've posted gives a vivid glimpse into what's happening in just one moor. The memory I'll take from it was the alien environment created for Red Grouse, shown in the aerial end shot, a true blot on, and devastation of the landscape.

Raptor Persecution as reported on Channel 4, click here for video

Full frame Tree Sparrow juvenile filmed in my garden, click here  

Pink-footed Goose at Montrose Basin, looks uninjured, click for video 

Leucistic, or whatever Chris Packham said, a white Eider duck at the Ythan, click here  from 29/5/2019

Olive said it's a Wood Mouse as shown in her tory newspaper today, and the tories are always right (a deliberate pun!)

One of my tadpoles, quite large now but no sign of legs yet

Little Ringed Plover - 2017

Little Ringed Plovers battle to keep their unborn bairn (from 9/6/2017)

The Black-headed Gulls are the main suspects for the disappearance of two of the Little Ringed Plover eggs from the nest I've previously blogged about. There are 14 gull nests nearby but it's possible a crow or a magpie nesting in the area did the deed although they'd most likely have taken all of the eggs. The first photo is from Carnoustie Golf Links which Olive wanted me to post.

Latest Little Ringed Plover video, click here,  shows the male vacating the nest as the female arrives to sit. The female has a metal ring of unknown origin.

Five of the six cygnets on the small pond on the Carnoustie Golf Links boundary with Barry Buddon Camp. Unfortunately the other pair of Mute Swans on the links "lost" their four cygnets according to a contractor on the course but he re-united two of them later. Let's hope the parents find the other two somewhere on the links soon.

Turning the single egg that remains

Sitting tight but they never did so for long, although to their credit they never ventured far and were always close enough to return to defend the egg

Heading off a Black-headed Gull just out of shot, the gull was testing their attention and resolve. I note that the nest has been re-shaped and now has a bit of a cup. The stone to the right of the egg had looked like a broken egg but photos showed that not to be true, showing the value of having a photo for evidence