Seen today

[Pingu]

Dolphins leaping at the entrance to the harbour today.

[Steph]

Buzzard going over my flat.

Next time, don't leave the door open.

Or the dead JWs on the steps....

[clarion]

Pied wagtail in the car park at work.  I think this is the third time I've mentioned it, but the wagtail is just such a beautiful bird that I've always loved, and it brings me delight to see them.

I recall that there was a pair nesting in the ventilation bricks at my school, above the window of the classroom where I was supposed to be learning English but instead spent my time watching them swooping out and back.

[Steph]

Motacilla alba yarelli was one of two birds that were held out as uniquely British species (the other being Lagopus lagopus scotica, the red grouse)

Oddly, the one bird that is now seen as uniquely British is Loxia scotica, the Scottish crossbill, the only vertebrate unique to the British Isles. And it doesn't pay tuition fees...

[Pingu]

SQUIRREL!

[SteveC]

Red Kite above the A303 just east of Stonehenge. We've been told they've made it that far south and west and have friends who've seen them, but a first for us. 

[Wowbagger]

A new species of roadkill: common bream.

[Bledlow]

Two buzzards which looked as if they were quarrelling, over Woodcote, NW of Reading. I don't remember seeing buzzards round there before. They're usually south of the M4, SW of Reading.

I've heard concern expressed that they may be losing out to kites, but this is an intrusion by buzzards into kite territory.

Lots of birdsong, woodpeckers hammering away, etc. Small birds dashing around. Crocuses, snowdrops en masse, catkins - spring is busting out all over.

[Peter]

What's Woodcote like, that buzzards would quarrel over it?

[Bledlow]

Well, there's a rather nice flint-walled cottage very close to where the buzzards were, on a gentle south-facing slope, big garden, good views  . . . .   

[woollypigs]

A few days ago, not close enough to see if it was a bee or wasp but close enough that it was one of them stingy things.

[woollypigs]

And now at home - a wasp crawled out of the kitchen cupboard and tried to escape through the window. I tried to persuade it to got back to sleep, but it was rather keen to go out and I did warn it that there is a good chance for a cold snap before spring.

[CrazyEnglishTriathlete]

A newt in our garden pond.  Turned up in the net as I was cleaning out excess vegetation ready for the spring.  Never knowingly seen a newt before.  Set it back to swimming around.

Led to predictable sign language through the window to try to explain to Mrs CET what I had seen.   

Do newts and frogs get on or do they compete?

[Bledlow]

Vast amounts of wildlife in the tiny pond on our allotment. Hordes of snails, & more various arthropods than you can shake a stick at.

Not long ago the pond seemed fauna-free.

[red marley]

Do newts and frogs get on or do they compete?

In our pond at least they definitely do compete. Or rather, about nowish for the next few weeks we can expect much frog-on-frog action leading to a pond full of frogspawn. The newts then move in and slowly munch their way though the pre-made jelly snacks. So we are left with a colony of 20+ Alpine newts with bright orange undersides that seem to be doing much better than the native frogs.

[Steph]

Heard, my back garden, 0725 today. Drumming great spotted woodpecker.

[Pingu]

Yesterday: seals basking, skylarks singing, GSW drumming, first lambs of the year, a buzzard swooping down quickly & coming up with an unidentified something in its talons.

[Tim Hall]

Tuesday, a muntjac grazing. On the verge of the M11.

[CAMRAMan]

Yesterday, on one of my lilac crocuses, a honey bee.

[Bledlow]

Tuesday, a muntjac grazing. On the verge of the M11.

On Wednesday night one stood at the side of a country lane in S. Oxfordshire & watched 17 cyclists pass by. I was maybe 2 metres from it as I cycled past.

Most of the 17 didn't see it. Dull brown thing against a dull brown hedge, at night.

[Ruth]

I'm almost certain I saw a marsh harrier yesterday, just North of Alnmouth.  It's a fair way out of its range though.

[clarion]

On Friday, I saw a fox in the car park at work, and got a few photos before it slunk off.  I haven't had a chance to edit them yet.

[Tim Hall]

Last night as I tootled along Lonesome Lane, beloved of the FNRTTC, I was accompanied by a bat for a hundred metres or so. Don't know what sort other than being  quite big and bat like.

[Wowbagger]

A newt in our garden pond.  Turned up in the net as I was cleaning out excess vegetation ready for the spring.  Never knowingly seen a newt before.  Set it back to swimming around.

Led to predictable sign language through the window to try to explain to Mrs CET what I had seen.   

Do newts and frogs get on or do they compete?

Every year my brother squanders his retirement goes looking for frogspawn to put in his home-made tadpole rearers. Many of the tadpoles end up in his own garden pond.

He has on many occasions seen newts eating the frog tadpoles so last year he decided to reduce the number of newts in his pond by netting them. It's quite easy as he just waited and every time a newt came up for air he netted it and put it in a bucket ready for transportation to a pond half a mile or so away.

I can't remember how many newts he caught but it was into the hundreds. I'll ask him how many it was.

[Crumbling Nick]

Do newts and frogs get on or do they compete?

AIUI newts are happy to eat tadpoles, though presumably not newt tadpoles . I wouldn't describe that as "getting on" with frogs, at least, not outside the food and drink part of yacf .