Female Sparrowhawk in the garden

Dear Readers, my February copy of ‘British Birds’ has arrived. One of my favourite parts is where bird lovers of all kinds report on the behaviour of their local birds, and in this issue there’s an interesting story about a sparrowhawk who appears to have used a walker as a way to flush small birds.

Andy Stoddart had gone for a walk at Blakeney Point in Norfolk when he noticed a young female sparrowhawk ‘accompanying’ him – she would land on the ground, wait for him to catch up and then fly on a short distance. If any small birds were flushed by the walker, she would chase them (though she was never successful). This went on for an hour and a half as Stoddart strolled along. He thought at first that he might be ‘flushing’ the sparrowhawk but she seemed completely unbothered by him, at one point landing less than six feet away.

Now, I have been used by a sparrowhawk as cover – on one occasion I was sitting in Culpeper Garden in Islington, minding my own business, when a sparrowhawk flew over my shoulder, so close that its primary feathers nearly brushed my cheek, and plunged into a bush full of sparrows. This hunt, too, was unsuccessful, but I’m convinced that the bird knew that I was between him and the sparrows, and that the sparrows couldn’t see him. And many large predators use jeeps and other vehicles not only as cover, but sometimes as a vantage point in the Kruger and other national parks in Africa. What adaptable, opportunistic animals these are! I guess if you miss the vast majority of the kills that you attempt you’re going to try everything you can think of to increase your odds of getting a meal.

Mistle Thrush in Cherry Tree Wood

And whilst we’re on the subject of opportunists, another reader, Malcolm Ogilvie, who lives on Islay in the Scottish Highlands, has found a photo of a mistle thrush eating a common lizard. Apparently mistle thrushes will also kill  nestling dunnocks, song thrushes and blackbirds and feed them to their own young. That line between ‘carnivores’ and ‘herbivores’ is often not as strict as we like to think, with many animals not turning up their noses/beaks if the chance of some protein presents itself.