Chiltern Birder

The starlings are back. There seem to be several families turning up with their chicks working their way through the fat bars. We are shifting about half a litre of fat per day at the moment. What puzzles me is the location of the nesting colony. Apart from a few weeks when the juveniles are recently fledged I am unlikely to see any in the garden at all. This year we had one or two individuals turning up and then a day or two later the numbers exploded. Out and about we had an interesting encounter driving home in the car. Near Ley Hill, just at the edge of the headlights a long grey shape crossed the road. From the outline it seemed to be a ferret or polecat. It seemed pale in the light but at the extreme point of the beam I couldn't make out any colouring. Coming back from Oxford yesterday in early afternoon the car in front of me suddenly started slowing and eventually came to a halt. I was just wondering what the problem was when a muntjac strolled nonchalantly past witho...

Not much to say except that I saw a polecat last night, the third occasion in my life. Driving home up the hill from Boxmoor to Bovingdon around midnight a mustelid ran across the road in front of me. It was dark but the glimpse that I had of the face was that of a polecat or polecat-ferret.

I had quite a suprise last night driving home. Between Latimer and Ley Hill I saw a polecat at the edge of the road. It was facing me and the "bandit mask" was very clear in the headlights. A little way down the road and the elation rapidly vanished when we saw a recently killed young badger. Locally cuckoos have been very vocal and in Chalfont St Peter I heard a swift calling overhead. This was nice as the wet start to the spring meant that they had a severe food shortage. In the hot weather a garden pond was being visited by breeding damselflies, I am not an expert on odontae but one pair seemed to be common blues and the other possibly small red.