El Annie
Saturday 1st March 2003, 19:59
Unhappy landing: ancient heronry threatened by airport plans....
In the gloaming they appear as fantastic shapes – angular, elongated, with almost a touch of the prehistoric about them, as if pterodactyls were swooping through the skies. But these are herons, scores of them, floating from the marshes where they have spent the day hunting, to their roosting place in an ancient wood. The flap of their great wings is languid and deliberate, the bringing forward of their gangly legs seems clumsy in the extreme, but unfailingly they come to rest in the top branches of the oak trees uttering hoarse squawks – an unearthly sound in the still evening air.
More information - Independent
Birds home in on boxes............
Two Notts farmers are lending their support to National Nest Box Week by encouraging birds to nest on their land. Roger Pykett has planted hedgerows and trees and attracted tree sparrows and blue tits to his Newark farm. Nest boxes provided by the Notts Wildlife Trust and the RSPB were used by eight pairs of tree sparrows who produced 72 chicks. A barn owl box has now been installed on the land, funded by the Notts Biodiversity Action Group. Mr Pykett is now waiting for barn owls to find their new home after reverting some arable farming land to grass land using Countryside Stewardship Scheme funding.
More information - this is nottingham
You can find out more about toady's wildlife issues by visitng the conserv@tion site at - http://www.habitat.org.uk/news1.htm
Annie :)
In the gloaming they appear as fantastic shapes – angular, elongated, with almost a touch of the prehistoric about them, as if pterodactyls were swooping through the skies. But these are herons, scores of them, floating from the marshes where they have spent the day hunting, to their roosting place in an ancient wood. The flap of their great wings is languid and deliberate, the bringing forward of their gangly legs seems clumsy in the extreme, but unfailingly they come to rest in the top branches of the oak trees uttering hoarse squawks – an unearthly sound in the still evening air.
More information - Independent
Birds home in on boxes............
Two Notts farmers are lending their support to National Nest Box Week by encouraging birds to nest on their land. Roger Pykett has planted hedgerows and trees and attracted tree sparrows and blue tits to his Newark farm. Nest boxes provided by the Notts Wildlife Trust and the RSPB were used by eight pairs of tree sparrows who produced 72 chicks. A barn owl box has now been installed on the land, funded by the Notts Biodiversity Action Group. Mr Pykett is now waiting for barn owls to find their new home after reverting some arable farming land to grass land using Countryside Stewardship Scheme funding.
More information - this is nottingham
You can find out more about toady's wildlife issues by visitng the conserv@tion site at - http://www.habitat.org.uk/news1.htm
Annie :)