Thursday, February 24, 2011

Herons 'n' Bats

Filming Herons building their nests at Luddendenfoot this morning. Looks like 6 active nests this year...certainly 5. Only one pair building as the others were sitting already with their partners out fishing somewhere.

Interestingly, the pair that were building had a third bird perched by the nest playing gooseberry. I assume that this was one of last years youngsters as it didn't appear to be competing for the attention of either of the two nest-builders.

Even more curious was a day-flying bat that I first saw around 11.45 flying above the tree canopy. I didn't manage to get any footage unfortunately, but a visiting birder, (S. Greenbank), managed to get a still as it cleared the trees. The bat was quite large with a rufus body and was still in the air at around 2.00 in the afternoon.

I have asked him to try to post a picture after he returns home.

1 comment:

Mike Stead said...

I had a similar sighting of a large day-flying bat - possibly a Noctule,over the river at Bradley Hall about 3 weeks ago; not an expected sight in the middle of winter !