Henley Visit (1 Viewer)

Kits

Picture Picker

Social Media Editor

• Jun 16, 2008

• #1

OH and I had a picnic down by the Thames at Henley yesterday and had a lovely time watching all the different boats and rowers. There weren't that many birds, but we did see Mute Swans, Canada Geese and goslings, Mallards and ducklings, coots, moorhens, common tern, black headed gull and many, many swifts and swallows - but they were far too quick for our cameras. What really made the afternoon for us were three Red Kite who circled above us the whole time we were there.

 

Attachments

• 
  swift.jpg

  16.1 KB · Views: 22
• 
  ducklings.jpg

  141.4 KB · Views: 19
• 
  cangeesegos.jpg

  58.4 KB · Views: 13
• 
  rk1.jpg

  16.5 KB · Views: 21
• 
  rk2.jpg

  23.9 KB · Views: 16

R

Ruth Daniel

Well-known member

• Jun 16, 2008

• #2

Oooooh nice Kite pics Kits and the Swift is a nice one too!:t:
Hubby saw a Red Kite over the M40 (?) whilst down in Oxford last week......i've not seen one yet this year!

 

pie

Well-known member

• Jun 16, 2008

• #3

Hi Kits,
Sounds & looks like you had a glorious day out, the babies look so cute.
What a treat with the Red Kites!
Well captured Kits

 

M

Mabel

Dance the ghost with me

• Jun 16, 2008

• #4

Babeeeeees!! Nice shots, Kits.

 

Wendy Morris

Well-known member

• Jun 16, 2008

• #5

Excellent shots, Kits. Love the babies, but the Red Kite beats them!

Ruth, yes it is the M40 where the Kites are. On a fine day, if you travel between junctions 5 & 6 down through the cutting over the edge of the Chilterns, you will be very unlucky if you do not see Red Kites. They were released there in the early 90s and have gone from strength to strength ever since.

 

Judo

Well-known member

• Jun 16, 2008

• #6

Lovely photos Kits, & that Swift looks pretty good to me, as do the Red Kites, which would be a first for me, and cute babies too, what a lovely picnic you had to be sure.

 

NIK III

Well-known member

• Jun 17, 2008

• #7

Sounds like a nice spot for a picnic Kits, and for a few pics. You did well with the Swift, I'm still trying to get one in the viewfinder.

 

Pam_m

Well-known member

• Jun 17, 2008

• #8

Well done with your pics, kits! Hoping to see a few Red Kites myself again soon! Great aren't they!

 

R

Ruth Daniel

Well-known member

• Jun 17, 2008

• #9

Wendy Morris said:

Ruth, yes it is the M40 where the Kites are. On a fine day, if you travel between junctions 5 & 6 down through the cutting over the edge of the Chilterns, you will be very unlucky if you do not see Red Kites. They were released there in the early 90s and have gone from strength to strength ever since.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info Wendy.......I wasn't with him so haven't seen any myself this year.......yet!o

 

B

bill moss

Well-known member

• Jun 17, 2008

• #10

Hi Kits,

Strange to think that that area is now the most likely place in the UK to see Kites away from artificial feeding areas; I go back to a time when your only chance (and fairly slim at that) was to go to mid-Wales and hope.

Nice shots of the Kites and the Swift. Where are all the Swifts this year, the only ones (6) that I've seen so far were at Christchurch (over St Catherine's Hill) on the 1st.

Bill

 

Kits

Picture Picker

Social Media Editor

• Jun 17, 2008

• #11

Thank you all!

We do have a pair of red kite near us, but I haven't seen three together before.

Bill - get down to Remenham near Henley. I lost count of the number of swifts there were there!

 

JimMorris

Registered User

• Jun 21, 2008

• #12

There is a feeding station for Red Kites at Stokenchurch just off junction 5 of the M40. I have counted 29 over the motorway at one time. Probably missed a few as I was driving at the time.

 

Kits

Picture Picker

Social Media Editor

• Jun 21, 2008

• #13

We saw 2 more today round about juction 14 of the M4 as we were going over to Bristol.

 

Helen O

Anything that flies

• Sep 13, 2008

• #14

JimMorris said:

There is a feeding station for Red Kites at Stokenchurch just off junction 5 of the M40. I have counted 29 over the motorway at one time. Probably missed a few as I was driving at the time.

Click to expand...

Hi Jim, I think you possibly mean that someone feeds them privately in a garden? Quite a few people do this, but we have never had any official feeding station in the Chilterns for the kites, since their reintroduction began in 1989.

However, we do have a CCTV nestwatch of a kite nest that shows at a garden centre just off junction 5 of the M40. The nest failed this year, so I have been showing video clips of the kite chicks I was taking care of prior to translocation to Aberdeen, Scotland.

Hope this helps.