Owl

[Deleted User] · March 2012

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miss annie · March 2012

<p>There are loads of owls around, you might be sharing yours with tosscat. </p><p><a href="http://www.stroudgreen.org/discussion/comment/47032#Comment_47032">http://www.stroudgreen.org/discussion/comment/47032#Comment_47032</a></p>;

[Deleted User] · March 2012

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barebackreader · March 2012

Have you been hearing the woodpeckers too? They arrived en masse a few weeks ago and spend all day drumming and shrieking. The Woody Woodpecker cartoons were, it seems, ornithologically accurate.

ADGS · March 2012

I've also heard one, presumably on the Parkland Walk, while walking along Haslemere.<br>

Miko · March 2012

Not heard the owl but I have heard the woodpecker tap-tap-taping and yelp-yelp-yelping

miss annie · March 2012

Simon Barnes wrote a really interesting article about Woodpeckers at the weekend, all about how different the various kinds of Woodpeckers hammering is. Very easily identifiable apparently.

barebackreader · March 2012

The Mount View woodpeckers are Lesser Spotted: white and black barred wings with dashing red skullcaps.

checkski · March 2012

I doubt if they are <EM>Lesser S</EM>potted. I believe they are quite rare.

miss annie · March 2012

Probably Greater Spotted, they fit your description and are much more common in urban locations.

sophie · March 2012

There are definitely lesser spotted ones around, I used to see them in my garden in Manor House. But now I live on Mount View Road! Where they have owls too?! Twitchy heaven.<br>

sophie · March 2012

what a <a href="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/119/282435533_1fd503e9bd.jpg">cutie</a><br>

tosscat · March 2012

<P>I've been pressed to the window every weekend morning hoping to spot the the blasted woodpeckers - they are new to the area. I've seen the green woodpeckers in the park, but would love to see the lesser spotted ones.</P> <P>I've seen quite a few jays lately - always nice.</P>

checkski · April 2012

I was right - it was almost certainly great spotted woodpecker, according to last Thursday's Nature programme on Radio 4. Their numbers are increasing, while the lesser is becoming quite rare. The speaker said he has difficulty persuading people that it is a gsw they are looking at. They are very alike, except that the lsw is tiny, weighing no more than 22 grams. Interesting.

barebackreader · April 2012

Fair enough. I doubt I'd be able to see a bird weighing less than 22g down the length of my garden without field glasses, at least not clearly.<div><br></div><div>Still. It's nice to have new birds in the area, whatever their level of spottedness.<br><div><br></div><div> </div></div>

Miko · May 2012

Update: ive just spotted a green woodpecker next to the reservoir. Perhaps there never were any spotted ones?

miss annie · May 2012

Oh, they are always on the reservoir. They are ground feeders mostly. You'll find Greater Spotted fellows up in the trees.

tosscat · May 2012

I saw the lesser spotted yesterday morning. At last.

sophie · May 2012

see! i was right about the lesser spotteds! don't go telling me i can't distinguish between greater and lesser, i have VERY powerful binoculars and three different charity shop birdbooks.<br>

barebackreader · May 2012

The woodpecker controversy rages on. Perhaps I should throw a twitching party. A Greaters vs Lessers face-off with booze and binoculars.

tosscat · May 2012

I was just going with the consensus - it was 5.45am, I could tell it was a woodpecker, I could tell it was spotted, I could tell it was a female, I couldn't have said whether it was greater or lesser. I'll gen up, but it's taken me 3 months to to even clock the bloody thing.

miss annie · May 2012

<p>Lesser's are very stripey like this...</p><p><a href="http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/l/lesserspottedwoodpecker/index.aspx">http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/l/lesserspottedwoodpecker/index.aspx</a></p><p>Greater are a more bold graphic pattern like this...</p><p><a href="http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/g/greatspottedwoodpecker/index.aspx">http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/g/greatspottedwoodpecker/index.aspx</a></p><p> </p>;

berrynice · May 2012

<span style="font-style: normal; ">Lesser spotteds are much less common, but have definitely been recorded at Alexandra Park (though not </span><i>yet</i> at Stroud Green). However, a nightingale was recorded singing on the island in the Finsbury Park boating lake on Tuesday morning!! <div style="font-style: normal; "><br></div><div style="font-style: normal; "><br></div>

checkski · May 2012

Now that really is a first, if true! But it is all too easy to be over-enthusiastically wrong in this game, and I have learnt to be cautious, with my only middling knowledge of birds. Furthermore, and speaking as a musician, I'm surprised by how few bird-lovers, otherwise pretty expert, know nothing about their song. Many of the common birds sing ravishingly: could one of them have been mistaken for a nightingale? Just wondering...

berrynice · May 2012

I'm not a birdsong expert by any means, I have heard nightingales in Spain and Italy but wouldn't be able to recognise by song alone with any confidence. I found the record here - <a href="http://londonbirders.wikia.com/wiki/LatestNews">http://londonbirders.wikia.com/wiki/LatestNews</a>, and it was actually on Thursday, not Tuesday! I guess anything is possible when birds are on their migration as they are at the moment. I was also amazed that there have been so many sightings of ring ouzels at Alexandra Park recently - a bird I thought was really rare, and unheard of in London. There are people out there with binoculars seeing things that I have never even heard of!

checkski · May 2012

That's a very interesting and authoritative site, berrynice. A nightingale sang in Finsbury Park. Wow! Perhaps I should set that to music? Damn. Too late.

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