Disappearing Rookery (2 Viewers)

[TemporarilyMisplaced]

Hi all,

There is a rookery near my house (rural area, mostly dairy farming with a few sheep) which has been there since I have lived here but yesterday I noticed when walking by that it was very quiet and when I looked into the tree there wasn't a single nest in it, when before there had been loads. Would a dairy farmer get rid of them all and, if so, why? Or could it just be that the recent storms have obliterated them all - seems weird that every single one of them would be destroyed though.

This morning, the rooks are all there in the now nest-less tree so at least they haven't all disappeared too.

Thanks,

TM

 

[Richard Prior]

Welcome TM!
There was a thread on this subject which had lots of theories and possible explanations :

Rooks have left the Ancient Rookery

We have a farm of approximately 600 acres with 40 acres of scattered woodland. Rooks have been here since I can remember and always a sign of Spring the noise of the Rookery. Last year we had the main Rookery with about fifty nests in it overflowing into three more mini Rookeries. The Rooks...

www.birdforum.net

 

[TemporarilyMisplaced]

Welcome TM!
There was a thread on this subject which had lots of theories and possible explanations :

Rooks have left the Ancient Rookery

We have a farm of approximately 600 acres with 40 acres of scattered woodland. Rooks have been here since I can remember and always a sign of Spring the noise of the Rookery. Last year we had the main Rookery with about fifty nests in it overflowing into three more mini Rookeries. The Rooks...

www.birdforum.net

That's really interesting, thanks Richard. I'll go for a walk later and see if I can see another tree they might have moved it all to as it seems from that thread they do that sometimes. Seems incredibly odd but I'm sure I would have noticed if it was something more sinister. The tree is only about 300m from my house and I have no neighbours for half a mile in any direction so I'm sure I would have heard something if somebody was removing the nests. I can't see any reason the farmer would want rid of them - the gulls in the fields far outweigh the rooks.

Hopefully they've just decided to relocate, although I'm still quite sad as I really enjoyed seeing them all the time.